FILE - Police guard an area near an office of the Wagner Group, a private military contractor, in St. Petersburg, Russia, on June 24, 2023. Wagner chief Yevgeny Prigozhin launched a brief armed revolt against Russia's military leadership that posed the greatest challenge to President Vladimir Putin’s authority in his more than two decades in power. (AP Photo, File)
FILE - Businessman Yevgeny Prigozhin, left, serves a meal to Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, center, at a restaurant outside Moscow, Russia, on Nov. 11, 2011. Prigozhin, an ex-convict, owned a restaurant in St. Petersburg where the Russian leader took foreign leaders, earning him the nickname of "Putin's chef." He won lucrative catering contracts and later started a private military company. (AP Photo/Misha Japaridze, Pool, File)
FILE – Mercenaries from the Wagner Group, a private military contractor, sit on a tank in Rostov-on-Don, Russia, on June 24, 2023, as residents pose for a photo near the headquarters of the Southern Military District. The private military company ended a brief rebellion against some officials in the Russian Defense Ministry whom Wagner chief Yevgeny Prigozhin accused of not supplying his forces in Ukraine. (AP Photo, File)
ILE - Mercenaries of Russia's Wagner Group load a tank onto a truck in Rostov-on-Don, Russia, on June 24, 2023, following a brief rebellion led by Wagner chief Yevgeny Prigozhin. He had accused Defense Ministry officials of denying support to his fighters in Ukraine. The troops had taken over Russia's southern military headquarters in Rostov-on-Don and headed for Moscow but aborted the rebellion, which still undermined Putin's image of power. Prigozhin was killed two months later in a mysterious plane crash. (Vasily Deryugin/Kommersant Publishing House via AP, File)
FILE - Yevgeny Prigozhin, right, head of the Wagner private military contractor, poses for a photo with a civilian in Rostov-on-Don, Russia, on June 24, 2023. Prigozhin’s mercenary army had briefly seized a military headquarters in the city and started marching toward Moscow to oust the Defense Ministry's leaders, but then called it off. He had accused the Defense Ministry of starving his forces of ammunition in Ukraine. (AP Photo, File)
FILE - Police officers stand next to their car in an empty Red Square with St. Basil's Cathedral in the background in Moscow, Russia, on June 28, 2023. Life has returned to normal in the capital after a brief armed rebellion by mercenary chief Yevgeny Prigozhin on June 23-24, 2023. (AP Photo/Alexander Zemlianichenko, File)
FILE - The top Russian military commander in Ukraine, Gen. Sergei Surovikin, left, and Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu attend a meeting at an unknown location on Dec. 17, 2022, with President Vladimir Putin during his visit to troops fighting in Ukraine. Surovikin, who reportedly had close ties with Russian mercenary chief Yevgeny Prigozhin, was stripped of his post as deputy commander of forces in Ukraine after the brief uprising by Prigozhin on June 23-24, 2023. (Gavriil Grigorov, Sputnik, Kremlin Pool Photo via AP, File)
FILE - In this photo released by Belarus' Defense Ministry on July 20, 2023, Belarusian soldiers and mercenaries from Russia’s Wagner private military company pose for a photo amid maneuvers at a firing range near the border city of Brest, Belarus. On June 24, 2023, the private military company ended a brief rebellion against the Russian Defense Ministry that Wagner chief Yevgeny Prigozhin accused of failing to supply his forces in Ukraine. (Belarus' Defense Ministry via AP, File)
FILE - In this image taken from video, smoke rises from the crash of a private jet near the village of Kuzhenkino, Russia, on Aug. 23, 2023. The jet, flying from Moscow to St. Petersburg, was carrying Wagner Group head Yevgeny Prigozhin, who two months earlier launched a brief armed rebellion. Prigozhin and nine others aboard the jet were killed. (AP Photo, File)
FILE - Pallbearers carry the coffin of Dmitry Utkin, who oversaw military operations of the Wagner Group, a private military contractor, during his funeral at Federal Military Memorial Cemetery in Mytishchy, Russia, on Aug. 31, 2023. Utkin died in a suspicious plane crash along with Wagner chief Yevgeny Prigozhin, who had launched a brief rebellion in June 2023, seeking to oust Russia’s military leadership. (AP Photo/Alexander Zemlianichenko, File)
FILE - Wagner Group head Yevgeny Prigozhin attends the funeral at the Beloostrovskoye Cemetery outside St. Petersburg, Russia, on Dec. 24, 2022, of Dmitry Menshikov, one of his mercenaries who died fighting in Ukraine. Prigozhin made his name as the profane and brutal mercenary boss who in June 2023 mounted a brief armed rebellion that was the most serious challenge to the rule of Russian President Vladimir Putin. (AP Photo, File)
FILE - A fighter of the Wagner private military force touches a sculpture of Russian mercenary chief Yevgeny Prigozhin at his grave at the Porokhovskoye Cemetery in St. Petersburg, Russia, on Saturday, June 1, 2024. Prigozhin died in a suspicious air crash on Aug. 23, 2023, two months after launching a brief armed rebellion against the Russian military leadership. (AP Photo/Dmitri Lovetsky, File)
FILE - Lights Illuminate debris of a private jet that crashed near the village of Kuzhenkino, Russia, on Aug. 24, 2023. The jet, flying from Moscow to St. Petersburg, was carrying Wagner Group head Yevgeny Prigozhin, who two months earlier launched a brief armed rebellion. Prigozhin and nine others aboard the jet were killed. (AP Photo, File)
FILE - Russian President Vladimir Putin, center, talks with Gen. Valery Gerasimov, left, chief of the General Staff, and Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu after a meeting in Moscow, Russia, on Dec. 19, 2023. An armed uprising by mercenary chief Yevgeny Prigozhin on June 23-24, 2023, against the military leadership dealt a blow to Putin’s authority. (Mikhail Klimentyev, Sputnik, Kremlin Pool Photo via AP, File)
FILE - Russian President Vladimir Putin is seen on monitors in Moscow, Russia, on June 24, 2023, as he addresses the nation after a brief rebellion by mercenary leader Yevgeny Prigozhin. The mercenary group had taken over a military headquarters in the southern city of Rostov-on-Don. Putin denounced the rebellion by his onetime protege as a "betrayal" and "treason." (Pavel Bednyakov, Sputnik, Kremlin Pool Photo via AP, File)
FILE - Members of the Wagner Group private military contractor sit in vehicle in Rostov-on-Don, Russia, on June 24, 2023, as they prepare to leave an area at the headquarters of the Southern Military District. Wagner chief Yevgeny Prigozhin launched a rebellion that sought the ouster of Defense Ministry officials that he accused of not supplying his forces fighting in Ukraine, but he later called it off. (AP Photo, File)
FILE - A young woman lights a candle as others stand at a makeshift memorial near the Kremlin in Moscow, Russia, on Aug. 29, 2023, for members of the Wagner Group military contractor killed in a plane crash. Among the 10 people killed in the crash was Wagner chief Yevgeny Prigozhin, who two months earlier had launched a brief rebellion against Russia’s military leadership. (AP Photo/Alexander Zemlianichenko, File)