RUSSIAN authorities said today that they have dropped all charges against mercenary chief Yevgeny Prigozhin and others involved in Saturday’s armed rebellion.

This comes a day after Russian President Vladimir Putin blasted organisers of the weekend revolt as traitors who played into the hands of Ukraine’s government and its allies.

In a five-minute TV address, Mr Putin praised the rank and file of the mercenary Wagner Group for not letting the situation descend into major bloodshed. He said the nation had stood united against the uprising. 

Mr Putin, who did not name Mr Prigozhin, said mutiny organisers had tried to force the group’s soldiers to shoot their own.

He said Russia’s enemies had hoped the mutiny would divide and weaken Russia, “but they miscalculated.”

Earlier in the day, Mr Prigozhin defended his short-lived insurrection. He said he had not been seeking to stage a coup against Mr Putin but, instead, oust the military leadership.

Mr Prigozhin said he had been acting to prevent the destruction of the Wagner Group. 

“We started our march because of an injustice,” he said in an 11-minute statement on Monday, apparently a government order requiring Wagner soldiers, if they want to remain fighting, to sign contracts with the Defence Ministry by July 1, effectively disbanding the group despite its battlefield successes in Ukraine. 

Mr Prigozhin accused Russia’s military of mounting an attack on his troops.

The feud between the Wagner Group leader and the military top brass has festered throughout the war, erupting into mutiny when mercenaries left Ukraine and seized a military headquarters in the southern Russian city of Rostov. 

Later on Monday the Kremlin showed Mr Putin meeting top security, law enforcement and military officials, including Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu, who the uprising had tried to remove. Mr Putin thanked members of his team for their work over the weekend. 

Earlier, the authorities released a video of Mr Shoigu reviewing troops in Ukraine.

Western leaders have been muted in their comments on the mutiny. 

United States President Joe Biden said he was cautious about speaking publicly because he wanted to give “Putin no excuse to blame this on the West and blame this on Nato.”

“We made clear that we were not involved, we had nothing to do with it,” he said.