A leadership vacuum has been left by the death of Prigozhin, the UK says

As a result of Yevgeny Prigozhin’s death, the UK Ministry of Defence says there will be a leadership vacuum.

Prigozhin was a passenger on a private jet that crashed after taking off from Moscow. He’d led a failed mutiny against President Vladimir Putin in June.

In a morning update defence officials said his “hyper activity”, “drive for results” and “extreme brutality” are unlikely to be matched by any future leader of the Wagner group.

They say his death would “almost certainly have a destabilising effect”, especially because two other Wagner leaders – Dimitry Utkin and Valery Chekalov – also died in the crash.

Ukraine’s counteroffensive against Russia is moving slowly, and has only had partial success, according to U.S. General Mark Milley.

Nevertheless, he cautioned that it was too early to declare it a failure.

“The Ukrainians have a significant amount of combat power left; this is not over yet,” he told Jordan’s public service television.

It took Russia many months to prepare for the counteroffensive, during which it planted minefields, dug ditches, and erected tank obstacles.

“The idea of militarily kicking out 200,000 or 300,000 Russian troops is going to be very difficult and challenging,” he added.

“But at the end of the day, no matter which way it is, through diplomatic means or military means, at the end of the day Ukraine must remain free, sovereign, independent with its territory intact.”