Pentagon leaks West's ploy to delay Kiev’s attack, won’t hurt Ukraine, says Wagner boss

New Delhi: Wagner Group head Yevgeny Prigozhin on Friday said that the leaked Pentagon documents do not contain any strategic disclosures that could be detrimental to Kiev, and the media attention they have received must be an effort by the West to postpone the Ukrainian military’s widely anticipated “spring offensive.”

“The documents by themselves do not pose any strategic danger,” Prigozhin said in a statement posted on social media, describing their published contents as mostly being based on open sources.

“However, the leak was widely publicised and immediately after it, statements from sources close to the Pentagon began about the need to delay the offensive announced for 15 April until the summer,” he added.

Prigozhin said the 21-year-old Air National Guard member who is accused of leaking the information may have been a fool or a dupe, but “if this leak had not happened, it would certainly have been invented.”

He emphasised that nothing in the documents themselves would increase the risk to the Ukrainian military should it decide to conduct its long-awaited attack.

“It is clear that the military operations on Ukraine’s side are tactically directed by Ukrainian soldiers, but strategically by the so-called Western coalition, run by the UK and the US,” said Prigozhin.

He accused the West of “holding back” the Ukrainian military in a “dramatic pause,” after it had been assembled for attack, delaying the offensive that might actually inflict reputational harm on Russia with even a symbolic advance on any front ahead of 9 May, the anniversary of the great WWII victory over Nazi Germany.

“The Ukrainians are ready to attack. We are ready to repel the blow,” Prigozhin said.

“No negotiations. Only an honorable battle. And the sooner it starts, the better,” he added.

Jack Teixeira arrested for leaking documents

A 21-year-old US national guardsman, Jack Teixeira, was arrested by the FBI on Thursday for leaking highly classified US defence documents online. US authorities say sensitive government secrets were leaked in an online gaming chat group.

The leaked information appears to be classified US intelligence documents – some top secret – with a number of them related to the ongoing war in Ukraine.

Unlike recent leaks – including the information leaked by Snowden or former US army whistleblower Chelsea Manning – the files leaked by Teixeira seem to be hard copies of briefing materials.

The leaked files also carry information on US and its allies including Israel, South Korea and Turkey.

Since the leak of the documents, the highly classified information turned up across multiple social media platforms including, Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube.

However, Teixeira originally dumped them on Discord in his ‘Thug Shaker Central’ online gaming group. The documents drew more traction once they landed in far-right forums like 4Chan and pro-Russian chat groups on Telegram.

With inputs from agencies

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