By Bond Robertson 
Yevgeny Prigozhin, leader of the Russian mercenary group Wagner, makes a stunning statement in a new photo. Video on Telegram.
There, the man called “Putin’s cook” says he will run for president during the 2024 Ukrainian elections.
– I only have political ambitions when I look at everything around me. I’ve decided to run for president in 2024, says Prigozhin, before pausing and saying:
– as the president of Ukraine.
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In 2024, presidential elections are taking place in Russia and Ukraine, so Prigozhin’s small break is no coincidence, believes Niklas Rindbo, a researcher at the Danish Defense Academy specializing in the Wagner Group.
– We’ve seen Prigozhin make political contacts with a great deal of humor before, here he’s playing openly with speculation that he should be a potential rival to Putin. At first he suggests that he is, and then says that he is, as the President of Ukraine. But how could it be? says Niklas Rindbo Danish TV 2.
The rules for running for president in Ukraine meant that Russians weren’t allowed to run in elections anyway.
Anton Herashchenko, an adviser to Ukraine’s interior minister, is in no doubt about how to interpret the video.
– Prigozhin says he will run for president in Ukraine in 2024. The announcement is intended to divert attention from his political ambitions in Russia, where he dreams of coming to power and potentially being an alternative to Putin, he wrote on Twitter.
Rendboe doesn’t think one should take the Russian message too seriously, but the video isn’t necessarily entirely uninteresting either. He thinks playing around with the issue is a “rather risky move” when he already has a number of enemies in Russia.