Evgeny Prigozhin, the founder of the Russian private military group Wagner, confirmed on Wednesday that "an Iraqi citizen fighting with his group was killed in Ukraine on April 6, marking the first confirmed case of a Middle Eastern citizen's death in the conflict." The Russian media agency reported that the Iraqi Abbas Aba Thar Witwit died a day after arriving at a Wagner hospital in the city of Luhansk. The report mentions that an Iraqi volunteer with the Wagner group was killed near Bakhmut, Ukraine. He was awarded the Russian bravery medal and Wagner’s black cross. A video shows the awarding of medals to his family along with his coffin draped in the Iraqi flag.
The father of Witwit, while receiving honors for his son after his death, stated that he "supported his decision to join Wagner voluntarily." He said, "Abbas wanted to win his freedom and wanted to be a man who defends his freedom and himself; I tell him that he found his freedom in Russia."
Judicial documents reveal that a court in Kazan, Russia, issued a sentence in July 2021, sentencing Witwit to four and a half years in prison on drug-related charges.
