Decree published on Kremlin website obliges anyone working on behalf of the military in Ukraine to swear a formal oath of allegiance

The crash that killed militia leader Yevgeny Prigozhin has raised serious questions about the future of the mercenary Wagner Group of which he was the leader, especially following Putin’s demand for fighters to sign an oath of allegiance.

In African countries where Wagner provided security against groups like al-Qaida and the Islamic State, officials and commentators predict Russia will likely maintain its presence, placing the forces under new leadership. Others, however, say Prigozhin built deep, personal connections that Moscow could find challenging to replace quickly.

Lukashenko says Prigozhin dismissed warnings about threats to his life; Kremlin denies being behind plane crash; flight recorders and 10 bodies recovered

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The Belarusian president, Alexander Lukashenko, has said he warned the Wagner group chiefs Yevgeny Prigozhin and Dmitry Utkin – who apparently died in a plane crash on Wednesday – to watch out for possible threats to their lives, and insisted that Wagner fighters remain in Belarus. Lukashenko said on Friday that Prigozhin had twice dismissed his concerns about the possible threats. He said that during Prigozhin’s June mutiny he had warned he would “die” if he continued to march on Moscow, to which he said Prigozhin answered: “To hell with it – I will die.”

The Kremlin said western suggestions that Prigozhin had been killed on its orders were an “absolute lie”. It declined on Friday to definitively confirm his death, citing the need to wait for test results.

A second plane linked to Prigozhin by some Russian media has no connection to Wagner group and never did, the CEO of the aircraft operator company said. Russian media, mainly associated with a Wagner Telegram channel, had linked a second business jet with the mercenary group and reported it was also in the air at the time of the crash.

Russian investigators said they had recovered flight recorders and 10 bodies from the crash scene in Russia’s Tver region. “Molecular genetic analyses are being carried out to establish their identities,” Russia’s Investigative Committee said on social media on Friday.

The UK’s defence ministry has said there is not yet definitive proof that Prigozhin was onboard the plane that crashed with no survivors but that it was “highly likely” he was dead.

Russia’s paramilitary group Wagner is a spent force, Ukraine’s defence minister has said after Prigozhin’s presumed death. “There is actually no longer a Wagner group left as they were a year ago, as a serious fighting force,” Oleksii Reznikov told German newspaper Welt am Sonntag on Friday. “They are broken.”

The US will begin flight training for Ukrainian pilots on F-16 fighter jets in October, the Pentagon has announced. The training would begin after the pilots receive English-language training next month, a spokesperson said on Thursday. Several pilots and dozens of aircraft maintenance crew would take the training at an airbase in Arizona, he added.

Turkey sees “no alternative” to the original grain export agreement Ukraine struck with Russia, Ankara has said, dismissing an alternate route reportedly being considered by the US. Russia last month pulled out of the deal that enabled Ukraine to export grain from three Black Sea ports but Ukraine this month sent a cargo vessel to Istanbul to test the alternate route. However, Turkey’s foreign minister, Hakan Fidan, who met Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy in Kyiv on Friday, said Ankara was focused on reviving the original deal.

Heineken has completed its lengthy exit from Russia with the sale of its operations there for a symbolic €1, after Moscow clamped down on asset sales in retaliation for western sanctions.

German prosecutors say they are investigating the attempted murder of Berlin-based Russian journalist Elena Kostyuchenko after she was one of three Russian-exile journalists who experienced symptoms consistent with poisoning last October.

The US state department has imposed sanctions on 13 people and entities it said were reportedly connected to the forced deportation and transfer of Ukraine’s children.

Danish film-maker Lars von Trier has defended himself from a backlash after writing a social media post that criticised Denmark’s donation of F-16 fighter jets to Ukraine. “Russian lives matter also!” he wrote on Instagram on Tuesday after Volodymyr Zelenskiy’s visit to Denmark.

Pentagon spokesman says press reports of missile ‘inaccurate’; Russian president says former head of Wagner made ‘serious mistakes in his life’

The UK schools minister, Nick Gibb, said the government was monitoring the situation carefully following reports that the leader of the Wagner mercenary group died in a plane crash.

Gibb told GB News: “We are obviously monitoring the position very carefully. We’re working with our allies to see how matters develop.”

Wagner leader and chief commander Dmitry Utkin were onboard the crashed Embraer plane, according to Russian officials

• Yevgeny Prigozhin onboard plane in fatal crash, says Russia
• What next for the Wagner group? | Analysis
• Death will leave lasting mark on Russian army and elite

Russia has appointed a new acting head of its aerospace forces to replace Sergei Surovikin, nicknamed “General Armageddon”, the RIA state news agency reported on Wednesday.

In June, US intelligence claimed that Surovikin, who previously led the invasion force in Ukraine, had prior knowledge of Yevgeny Prigozhin’s uprising, in which Wagner group mercenaries captured the city of Rostov and moved on Moscow before cutting an amnesty deal.

Ex-chief of the Russian Air and Space Forces Sergei Surovikin has now been relieved of his post, while colonel-general Viktor Afzalov, head of the main staff of the airforce, is temporarily acting as commander-in-chief of the airforce”.

Russian leader, wanted under international arrest warrant for alleged war crimes in Ukraine, gives speech by video link to summit in South Africa. This live blog is now closed

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Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, has posted a picture of himself alongside Nikolai Denkov, the prime minister of Bulgaria, with whom he said he had “fruitful talks” at the Ukraine-Balkans summit on Monday.

Zelenskiy said the two leaders had discussed further cooperation, Black Sea security and alternative grain corridors, adding that he expected to meet more “Balkan colleagues” on Tuesday.

TU-22M3 – used extensively in missile strikes on Ukraine – seen burning in images shared on social media

• Russia-Ukraine war – latest news updates

A drone appears to have destroyed a supersonic Russian bomber on an airfield hundreds of kilometres from Ukraine, British military intelligence has said, the latest in a string of successful assaults on prestige infrastructure and military hardware.

These attacks, far beyond the frontlines, are powerful propaganda for Ukraine, though Kyiv rarely claims them directly. Hits on key assets, which are meant to be heavily guarded by the latest technology, is highly damaging to morale in Russia, even if they do not change the balance of forces on the battlefield.