London Reportedly Considering Labeling Wagner Group Terrorist Organization

MOSCOW (Sputnik) - The UK Home Office is discussing potential plans to designate the Wagner Group private military company a terrorist organization, The Telegraph reports.

A final decision has not been made yet and talks about proscription are at an early stage and are not as advanced as the planned proscription of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).

Nonetheless, the Wagner Group could be labeled as a terrorist organization "much quicker" than the IRGC, insiders told the newspaper on Friday.

On Monday, UK Foreign Office ministers will discuss Wagner and its activities, according to The Telegraph.

If the military group is designated as a terrorist organization by the United Kingdom, it will become a criminal offense in the UK to belong to the Wagner Group, attend its meetings, encourage support for it, or carry its logo in public. It could also affect the group’s money-raising abilities, if any of its revenue streams run through British financial institutions, The Telegraph said.

The Wagner Group has been participating in Russia's special military operation in Ukraine and played an important role in taking control of the city of Soledar. The liberation of Soledar has opened the way to the bridgehead of Sloviansk and Kramatorsk, which can become a turning point in wrestling control over the entire territory of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) from Ukraine, according to DPR acting head Denis Pushilin.

The Ukrainian Prosecutor General's Office said on Friday that it had charged Yevgeny Prigozhin, the head of the Wagner Group, with infringement on Ukraine's territorial integrity due to the group's active role in the Ukraine conflict.

In January, the US Treasury announced that the United States had designated the Wagner Group as a significant transnational criminal organization. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said commenting on the decision that it would not have any significance for Russia or for the group itself.