The State Department has yet to verify information about the death of an American volunteer in Ukraine. The possible death of a US citizen on Tuesday was reported by Yevgeny Prigozhin, head of Wagner PMC. Asked about Prigozhin’s statement, a State Department spokesperson said Washington was “aware of the information” and was seeking more information.
“Our ability to verify reports of deaths of US citizens in Ukraine is extremely limited,” the State Department spokesperson said.
According to Prigozhin, an American who came to Ukraine as a volunteer and fought alongside the Ukrainians died in the east of the country during the fighting.
In a video posted on Telegram by pro-Kremlin Russian military commissar Alexander Simonov, Yevgeny Prigozhin showed the body of a man lying under the rubble of a building, claiming the deceased was a US citizen. The exact location of the filming of the video is unknown. According to Simonov, the video was made in the Artemivsk region (as the Russian invaders call Ukrainian Bakhmut, which has become the center of the fiercest and most protracted fighting over the past six months).
Prigogine showed the deceased’s ID to the camera, without giving his full name.
“We will bring him back to the United States. We’ll put him in a coffin with an American flag. Respectfully, because he did not die in his grandfather’s bed, but in war,” Prigogine said.
Agence France Presse and CNN Channel could not verify the authenticity of the documents and cannot confirm that the deceased was a US citizen.
Prigozhin’s interlocutor, in a video published today, tells him that the young man died in battle: he retaliated against the Russians who attacked him, but he himself died of his wounds.
“He hit back. He died in action, so tomorrow morning we will hand over his documents and we will collect everything,” added the head of Wagner PMC.
Prigozhin and the Wagner Group often post openly propaganda videos and often mix real images with statements that have little to do with reality.
A State Department spokesperson on Tuesday expressed “condolences to the families of all those who died as a result of Russia’s unprovoked and unwarranted war against Ukraine.” He stressed that Americans should not travel to Ukraine.
“We reiterate our message that U.S. citizens should not travel to Ukraine due to the active armed conflict and the persecution of Americans in Ukraine by Russian security forces. U.S. citizens in Ukraine should leave immediately if there is safe to do so using commercial or private ground transportation options,” the State Department added.
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