MOSCOW -- Russian journalists who were killed in the Central African Republic had been working on an investigation into Russian private military contractors and the mining industries there, their editor said Wednesday. Russian filmmaker Alexander Rastorguyev was killed along with cameraman Kirill Radchenko and war correspondent Orkhan Dzhemal in the Central African Republic while filming an investigative documentary about the Wagner group, a private Russian military firm allegedly linked to Russian President Vladimir Putin, the Reuters news agency reported. The journalists were in the Central African Republic on an assignment for the Investigation Control Center, a Russian online news organization financed by Mikhail Khodorkovsky, an oil tycoon who now lives in exile. Khodorkovsky said on Facebook Wednesday that the journalists were collaborating with his investigative project on a story entitled “Russian mercenaries.” They were looking into a private security company operating in CAR that is linked to a businessman associated with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Three people are killed and robbed in an ambush near Sibut, Central African Republic. The Mikhail Khodorkovsky-financed Investigations Management Center says that they were Russian journalists who worked with them on a documentary about Wagner Group mercenaries and Russian mining interests in the country.