ISW: Thousands of Wagner fighters will be under Chechen command

"Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov claims that former mercenaries from the Wagner group will come under the command of Chechen forces. However, some sources dispute his stated figure of 3,000 soldiers."
This was announced by the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) in its latest report.
Kadyrov issued a statement on April 5, saying that as a result of the negotiations, it was agreed that the former mercenaries would join the Chechen special forces unit Akhmat.
The negotiations were conducted with the leader of the Wagnerites, Alexander Kuznetsov, who used the nickname "Ratibor".
Kadyrov explained that the vacancies in the Akhmat unit were provided by the Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD), and the former Wagner forces would report to the MoD, not the Rosgvardiya command.
Reports indicate that the Russian Defense Ministry is "formalizing control of some elements of the remaining forces of the Wagner group, a goal it has been pursuing since 2023," the IIV said.
Analysts believe it was the Ministry of Defense's attempts to take over Wagner that prompted the formation's leader, Yevgeny Prigozhin, to launch an unsuccessful rebellion in June 2023.
A Russian military blogger also accused Kadyrov of "exaggerating the number of transferred Wagner personnel, claiming that most of the group's employees hate Kuznetsov and are in Africa," IIV reported.
Another Kremlin-linked blogger reported that "Wagner forces previously formed the Kamerton detachment under the command of Akhmat Spetsnaz, and that the Russian MoD did not prohibit this detachment from using Wagner's insignia, networks and control systems." . /BGNES