Russia mercenary Wagner Group offered to tell Ukraine military Russia's troop locations, per leak

Yevgeniy Prigozhin, the owner of Russia's mercenary Wagner Group, offered to give information about Russian troop positions to Ukraine that could then be used as information in an attack, according to U.S. intelligence documents leaked onto the messaging platform Discord.

Prigozhin made the offer in late January as his mercenary forces were dying by the thousands in Bakhmut, Ukraine, The Washington Post reported Sunday. He said that if Ukraine withdrew from the area surrounding Bakhmut, he would give Kyiv information about Russia's troops.

Russian military commanders have failed to resupply the Wagner Group, Prigozhin, an ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin, has said. 

It is unclear what positions Prigozhin offered to give Ukraine, but two Kyiv officials said the Wagner leader has spoken multiple times to Ukrainian intelligence officials.

Ukraine's President Vlodomyr Zelensky would not confirm whether his country has had contact with Prigozhin, citing that it was an "intelligence" matter.

Russia and Ukraine have suffered steep casualties in the eastern Ukrainian city of Bakhmut, but Prigozhin had promised to take control of the city by May 9, before Russia’s Victory Day. 

Prigozhin has since publicly threatened to pull out. 

In one document, Prigozhin told a Ukrainian intelligence official that Russia's military lacked ammunition supplies and he advised Kyiv to assault Crimea, a Ukrainian area that Russia illegally annexed.

Kyiv also appears to suspect that the Kremlin knows about Prigozhin’s conversations with Ukrainian intelligence officials, per the documents. 

The Kremlin did not answer a request to comment about Prigozhin’s offer. 

When asked about his communications with Ukrainian intelligence officials, Prigozhin said via his Telegram: "Yes of course I can confirm this information, we have nothing to hide from the foreign special services. Budanov and I are still in Africa," referring to Ukraine's military intelligence head Kyrylo Budanov.

One of the documents states that Budanov "expected the Russians to use details of Prigozhin’s secret talks with the [Ukrainian intelligence service] and his meetings with their officers in Africa to make him appear to be a Ukrainian agent."

Madeleine Hubbard is an international correspondent for Just the News. Follow her on Twitter or Instagram.