Wagner forces halt advance on Moscow after calls for rebellion

Wagner mercenaries have halted their advance on Moscow, after claiming to get within 200km of the Russian capital.

Leader Yevgeny Prigozhin has put out a voice note on his Telegram channel saying he has agreed to stop “to avoid bloodshed”, and it comes after talks between Prigozhin and Belarusian leader Alexander Lukashenko, who is understood to have been involved in “de-escalating” the situation.

But, after President Putin’s televised statement, in which he described the day’s events as “a knife in the back of our people”, it is unclear what the future holds for Prigozhin and Wagner, who have been a key part of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.