Reuters World News - What now for Russia after Prigozhin? Plus, Trump in Georgia

Episode Date: August 24, 2023

The head of the Russian mercenary group Wagner, Yevgeny Prigozhin, is believed to have been killed in a plane crash. Donald Trump says he will turn himself in to a jail in Georgia to face charges of election interference. Plus, celebrations across India as its moon mission gets underway and North Korea fails in a second bid to launch a spy satellite.  Visit the Thomson Reuters Privacy Statement for information on our privacy and data protection practices. You may also visit megaphone.fm/adchoices to opt out of targeted advertising. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Today, Russian mercenary boss Yevgeny Prigogyn is believed dead, strengthening Vladimir Putin's grip on power. Trump heads to a Georgia jail to face criminal charges. Newcomer Vivek Ramoswamy steals the spotlight in the Republican debate. And India is over the moon about its lunar landing. This is Reuters World News with everything you need to know from the front lines in 10 minutes, every weekday. I'm Carmel Crimmons in Dublin. And I'm Tara Oaks in London. was Russia's most powerful mercenary. Now, two months to the day after leading an aborted

mutiny against Russia's military leadership, Yevgeny Perugosin is believed dead. The head of the Wagner group was listed as a passenger on a plane that crashed north of Moscow with no survivors. Videos appear to show the plane falling abruptly out of the sky. Some of his supporters have pointed the finger of blame at the Russian state, others at Ukraine, which marks Independence Day today. Neither the Kremlin nor Russia's defense ministry have commented on Progosian's fate. President Biden was asked whether he believed Russia's President Vladimir Putin was behind the incident. It means not much that happens in Russia, who's not behind? I don't know enough to know the crash. Whoever, or whatever, was behind the crash, Progogian's death would rid Putin of someone

who mounted the most serious challenge to his authority since he came to power in 1999. Near the building housing Wagner's offices in St. Petersburg, two masked men claiming to be members said they would wait for orders from the remaining Wagner commanders. Andrew Osborne has been following the breaking news. So Andrew, what are the likely repercussions from the Wagner group? Well, I mean, it's fair to say without exaggeration that Precogesion really dominated the Wagner group. So there must be questions about what happens to it now. there are questions, I'm sure, about, for example, what's going to happen to the thousands of Wagner fighters who are currently located in Belarus and have been training the Belarusian army?

And what is going to happen to all of the contracts which Wagner has to train and help militaries all across Africa and indeed in the Middle East? There have been some rumblings of discontent from them online and some of them have been talking about revenge. But so far, nothing has actually transpired in terms of action. So where does this leave Putin? And what message does this send to his enemies? With progosion now out of the way, obviously a lot of people, whatever the facts or the matter are, suspect that he has been specifically removed or punished. And that really makes Putin look stronger in some ways.

It sends a message to others who may be thinking of challenging his authority of going up against him that you don't really want to do that. You don't want to mess with me or with us. Now the other headlines making news around the world. Political newcomer Vivek Ramoswamy seized the spotlight in the first debate of the 2024 Republican primary race. In the absence of frontrunner Donald Trump, Ramoswamy was at the center of many of the debate's most dramatic moments, overshadowing Florida governor Ron DeSantis. The Bricks Group of Nations is inviting six countries to join its club, including Saudi Arabia and Iran. Leaders from Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa agreed to expand the block at a summit in Johannesburg. China is banning

all seafood from Japan after the release of treated radioactive water into the ocean. Japan and the UN nuclear watchdog have approved the release from the direct Fukushima plant as safe. North Korea has said that it will try again after a second attempt to place a spy satellite in orbit failed. The launch prompted an emergency warning in Japan just before 4 a.m. local time, telling residents of the southernmost prefecture of Okinawa to take cover. It's the one we've all been waiting for. Invidia knocked it out of the park with record results. Here's Stephen Nellis in San Francisco.

Behind NVIDIA's blockbuster numbers is a clear message that the craze around artificial intelligence technologies like ChatGBTBT is not going to die down anytime soon. Nvidia has a near monopoly on the silicon chips used to create technologies like ChatGPT, and plenty of companies seem to still want to buy those chips. Nvidia even said that it plans to buy back an additional $25 billion of its stock to back that optimism up. All of this is being driven by what Nvidia says is a major push to overhaul a trillion dollars' worth of data centers around the world to make those data centers work better for artificial intelligence. Former President Donald Trump is expected to surrender today in Georgia. He's facing criminal charges over his efforts to stay in power following his 2020 election defeat.

He and 18 other defendants are facing a total of 41 criminal counts, including allegations that he violated an anti-organized crime law known as RICO. Jack Queen is in Atlanta. Jack, what should we expect today? So Trump's booking will not be like any other criminal defendants booking. which this can normally take several hours minimum at the Fulton County Jail. But with Trump, I'm told that the Secret Service and Sheriff's deputies who run the jail, they're going to want to get him in and out as quickly as possible.

So they bring him in. They probably have that area on lockdown. He's not going to have any contact with other inmates. Unlike most suspects, he will not be handcuffed. And he'll get his mugshot taken. There's a brief medical questionnaire. He'll be fingerprinted. And they'll get him in and out of there as quickly as they can because neither the Secret Service

nor the Sheriff's office really wants to deal with having a fullerner. former president in such a volatile or potentially volatile environment for any long period of time. The racketeering charges Trump and 18 other co-defendants are facing are often used in mafia cases. How did Georgia prosecutors plan to try 19 people? So racketeering charges allow prosecutors to jointly prosecute a large number of people who are engaged in the same sort of criminal enterprise. For instance, District Attorney Fannie Willis's office, who brought the case against Trump, has used this law to go after groups of teachers who cheated on standardized test scores, for instance. And so that was defined by prosecutors as a criminal organization with a common criminal purpose. Of course, there are benefits

for prosecutors bringing charges against so many defendants at once, because under racketeering laws, that allows you to bring in a bunch of evidence and a bunch of conduct that may not necessarily be criminal on its own, but was part of this larger criminal scheme. But there are a lot of challenges that come with prosecuting 19 people at once, and most experts who I've talked to have said it probably means it's going to take a long time to get to trial for one thing. Fannie Willis has said that she wants to get to trial within six months, but that seems like a very, very ambitious goal that she will probably not be able to reach. Trump has called the Georgia indictments and the three others he's facing politically motivated.

That's the moment India made history is the first country to land a spacecraft on the south pole of the moon. Cheers from the Bengaluru control room as Prime Minister Narendra Modi looks on remotely from Johannesburg.

You can see him on screen waving India's flag. Celebrations are broken out across the country as the landing is seen as crucial not only to

lunar exploration, but India's standing as a space power. Nivi Vata Chargi watched the landing from the satellite command center of India's space agency.

So Nivi, how is India celebrating? Well, I mean, it's actually quite interesting, Carmel. As you know, India is a very religiously diverse country. And we saw, you know, communities from across the boat coming together and celebrating, arranging prayers and just rooting for the success.

That was a really nice thing to see. That's great. What does this landing mean for India? Well, I mean, it comes at a particularly important time for the country. The Modi government is all about uplifting the country's, you know, geopolitical prominence. It's pushing for a non-bipolar world. It's trying to stage itself as another superpower in Asia to take on China in many ways. And we got the national elections coming up next year.

So what comes next? Well, Indian Space Agency has plans to go to the sun next. That's supposed to be sometime this year. And they're planning to put a man in space. And then maybe potentially eventually the prize is lunar mining. That is the resources that every single country space agency is actually eyeing. That's it for today's episode of Reuters World News. We'll be back with our daily headline show on Friday.

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