Evgeny Prigozhin, a Russian businessman close to President Vladimir Putin, admitted on Monday that he interfered in the US elections and will continue to interfere in the future, the first admission of its kind from a figure Washington has formally placed in the circle of those involved in efforts to influence US politics.
"We interfered (in the US elections), we intervened and we are still interfering and we will continue to interfere. We know how to do this in our own way, carefully, accurately and smoothly," Prigogine said in a post on the social networking sites of his company, Concorde.
The comment was published hours before the US midterm elections, in response to a request for comment from a Russian news site.
"During our highly precise operations, we will remove both the kidneys and the liver at once," Prigogine said.
He did not know what he meant by that, nor did he clarify his vague comment.
Prigozhin's positions came in response to a question about accusations of Russian interference in the mid-term elections scheduled for Tuesday in the United States, which Moscow is closely monitoring in the context of its crisis with Washington since the start of its invasion of Ukraine.
Prigogine is subject to US and European sanctions, and has been accused for several years of interfering in US elections, especially the 2016 presidential election, and is accused in particular of creating "electronic armies" with fake accounts active on social media, in an attempt to influence voters by discrediting candidates or transferring them. False information, for example.
Prigozhin, often referred to as "Putin's chef" because his hospitality company is under contract with the Kremlin, is officially accused of sponsoring Russian-backed "farm trolls" (offices funded to hire people to spread inflammatory and incorrect comments online) that seek to influence American politics.
In July, the US State Department offered a $10 million reward for reporting information on Prigogine's connection to "interference in the US election."
Prigozhin was not known to the public until recently, but his statements increased during the war on Ukraine, including criticism of the performance of the Russian generals. .
At the end of last September, Prigozhin admitted to establishing the Wagner Group, a paramilitary group, to fight in Ukraine in 2014, confirming its presence in Africa, the Middle East and Latin America.
And last Friday, Wagner opened a defense technology center in St. Petersburg, a further step for Prigozhin to confirm his military credentials.
This paramilitary group has been suspected of carrying out the Kremlin's activities in the shadows for years in various theaters of operations, which Prigozhin and Moscow have always denied.