The "Wagner" paramilitary group is considering the idea of recruiting women detained in Russian prisons to send them to fight in Ukraine, after it did the same thing with men, according to its leader, Yevgeny Prigogin.
"Not only to work as nurses and operators, but also in sabotage groups or sniper teams. And we all know that this has already happened on a large scale," Prigogin said on Wednesday.
The statements of the "Wagner" commander seem to allude to women among the elite riflemen and those who belonged to partisan groups who fought during World War II, and who were a focus of Soviet propaganda.
"We are working in this direction. There is resistance, but I think we will overcome it," Yevgeny Prigogine said, according to his information service on Telegram.
He was responding to a letter from a Russian official from the Urals region, in which he stated that women detainees in a prison in the city of Nizhny Tagil had asked him to send them to the Ukrainian front to help the Russian army.
It is suspected that the Wagner Group has in recent months recruited a large number of detainees in Russian prisons and sent them to fight on the front lines in Ukraine, in return for promises of reduced sentences and attractive salaries.
The Wagner Group is the most famous Russian security company, and it is similar to the American Blackwater company, hundreds of Russian mercenaries work under its banner, and it undertakes - according to press reports - the implementation of what is described as dirty operations in various conflict zones.
Since 2014, this group has been accused of secretly serving the interests of Russian President Vladimir Putin and committing atrocities in several conflict zones, especially in Syria, Ukraine, Libya and other African countries.
Last September, Yevgeny Prigogin, 61, admitted that he had established this group after years of denial and had become openly active in Russia, an indication of his growing influence.
Prigogin is called "Putin's chef" because he owns and operates the "Concorde" company, which was organizing receptions in the Kremlin, and has been subject to US sanctions since December 2016.