Today, August 27, the Russian Deputy Minister of Defense, Yunus Bek Yavkurov, called on the Syrian Ministry of Defense to deport the "Wagner" militia fighters from Syria or they will join the Russian army.
These words were said during Yavkurov's visit to the Syrian capital Damascus in the morning, where he held a meeting with military commanders from the ranks of the regime, in order to discuss several issues, chief among them the issue of Wagner's Russian mercenaries active in Syria.
According to sources cited by the "Syrian Monitoring Center for Human Rights", Yavkurov instructed the leaders of the Syrian regime to inform Wagner of the need to withdraw from Syria or join the ranks of the Russian army stationed there.
It was reported that following these remarks, the Syrian Minister of Defense, General Ali Mahmoud Abbas, met with Wagner's commanders in Syria and offered them to hand over their weapons and withdraw from Syria within a month at most, or to join the Russian army in Syria and operate under his command.
The Wagner militia began operating in Syria in 2015, where it fought brutally alongside regime forces, and also worked to protect the oil fields in eastern Syria.
Press reports indicate that the "Wagner" militia are operating in the oil fields in Badia (Syrian desert), in addition to their presence in the territory subject to the understandings of Turkey and Russia, known as the "escalation zone", and there are more than 3,000 Syrian recruits under their command inside and outside of Syria.