Prigozhin memorial service has been held, spokespeople say

A private funeral was held Tuesday for Russian mercenary chief Yevgeny Prigozhin outside St. Petersburg, six days after his death in a plane crash, according to spokespeople.

The ceremony arrangements had been shrouded in secrecy, and there was tight security around the funeral, according to Reuters.

“The farewell to Yevgeny Viktorovich took place in a closed format. Those who wish to say goodbye may visit Porokhovskoye cemetery,” the mercenary leader’s press service said in a short post on Telegram.

The Kremlin has avoided any large ceremonies for the 62-year-old mercenary chief, who received Russia’s highest award for leading Wagner forces in Ukraine, before being condemned as a traitor by Russian President Vladimir Putin for his short-lived rebellion earlier in the summer.

Prigozhin died in a plane crash north of Moscow last week along with nine others, including his right-hand man, Dmitry Utkin, and Wagner’s logistics chief, Valery Chekalov.

The longtime leader of private military company the Wagner Group led a brief rebellion against Russian military leaders in June, which marked one of the biggest challenges to Putin’s rule since he gained power in 1999.

Putin did not plan to attend the funeral of Prigozhin, according to Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov.

The plane crash prompted speculation that the Wagner chief was intentionally killed by Putin as revenge for his June mutiny, which the Kremlin has denied as an “absolute lie.”