Kazakhstani authorities deny that Russia had asked for military help due to Wagner’s mutiny

The Akorda (the official residence of the president of Kazakhstan) has denied the information published by The Wall Street Journal about behind-the-scenes negotiations between Russia and Kazakhstan. The edition wrote that President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev refused to send Kazakhstan’s military to Russia in June 2023, when Eugene Prigozhin, the late head of the Wagner mercenary group, organized a mutiny in Russia.

The press service of Kazakhstan’s president has commented on the article by The Wall Street Journal that claims that Nikolay Patrushev, secretary of the Security Council in Russia, asked President Tokayev to send troops to Russia in order to crack down on Prigozhin’s mutiny.

«This information doesn’t reflect the reality,» Berik Uali, the official spokesperson for the president said.

What was the Kremlin’s reaction to the publication? Dmitry Peskov, the official spokesperson for Russian President Vladimir Putin, said that he wouldn’t comment on the article in WSJ.

«We’ve seen that publication but we don’t want to comment on it. I mean it’s always hard to comment on such materials,» Peskov told journalists.

«Unfortunately, WSJ likes to be engaged in the production of pulp fiction,» the Russian official noted.

The context. According to WSJ, Patrushev allegedly asked the president of Kazakhstan to give a hand to the Russian military if it failed to crack down on Prigozhin’s mutiny as Russia did in January 2022, when President Tokayev appealed to the Collective Security Treaty Organization against the backdrop of unrest within the country. However, Tokayev refused to do so, WSJ reported.

The Wagner Group’s mutiny was cracked down in July 2023, while Prigozhin died in an aircraft crash later in September.