Irish Examiner view: Is it better the devil you know?

Wagner rebellion

Members of the Wagner Group military company sit atop of a tank on a street in Rostov-on-Don, Russia, prior to leaving an area at the headquarters of the Southern Military District. Picture: AP Photo

It is a mark of how deeply depressing the war in Ukraine appears to be when a committed gangster and blood-soaked warlord can be viewed, however briefly, as an ally in the campaign against Vladimir Putin. But any such thoughts about Yevgeny Prigozhin, head of the so-called ‘Wagner Group’, can be dismissed in the blink of an eye.

Putin and Prigozhin are truly a case of Grim and Grimmer. Both hail from Leningrad, now St Petersburg, a city which once liked to think itself culturally, and socially, closer to the West than Moscow. Both have high self-esteem.