Putin’s New Defense Minister Secretly Had Close Ties to Yevgeny Prigozhin—and Stalin

The wiry-looking economist with no military experience who Vladimir Putin has chosen to serve as his new defense minister is apparently a lot closer to the murky underworld of Russian security services than was originally thought.

Andrei Belousov was close to the late Wagner Group boss Yevgeny Prigozhin—so close, according to a new report by opposition investigative reporting group Dossier Center, that the two were sometimes spotted “sitting with their arms around each other.”

A source told the outlet Belousov, who served as first deputy prime minister prior to his rise to defense minister, oversaw Prigozhin’s activities. The two are said to have spoken to each other like friends and “their work meetings were reminiscent of family get-togethers with tea; they informally discussed all the issues, then nodded to the junior employees, who then compiled everything into a real report.”

Read more at The Daily Beast.