The Institute for the Study of War (ISW) made the assessment in its latest report on the war in Ukraine, published on Sunday night, Polish state news agency PAP reported.
Tatarsky, a vocal supporter of Russia's war in Ukraine, died in an explosion at an event in a St Petersburg cafe on Sunday evening, according to news outlets.
Twenty-four audience members were taken to hospital and six were in critical condition, Russia’s health ministry said.
Tatarsky, whose real name was Maxim Fomin, had over 560,000 followers on the social messaging app Telegram and was one of Russia’s most influential military bloggers, according to Britain’s The Guardian newspaper.
Warning to Prigozhin for his criticism of the Kremlin?
The ISW noted that Tatarsky/Fomin was “a Wagner-affiliated convict who escaped from prison in Donetsk Oblast at the outset of Russia’s invasion of Donbas in 2014.”
Moreover, the the Street Food Bar #1 Café in downtown St. Petersburg, near the Neva river, where Tatarsky/Fomin was assassinated, reportedly belongs to Wagner Group financier Prigozhin, the US think tank added.
According to the ISW, Prigozhin “confirmed that he had offered his Street Food Bar #1 Café to the Russian ultranationalist movement ‘Kiber Front Z,’ to hold Fomin’s event and other nationalist gatherings.”
The US think tank suggested that Tatarsky/Fomin’s killing could have resulted “from Fomin’s proximity to Prigozhin.”
The ISW stated: “Fomin’s assassination may have been intended as a warning to Prigozhin, who has been increasingly questioning core Kremlin talking points about the war in Ukraine and even obliquely signalling an interest in the Russian presidency, whether in competition with [Russian President Vladimir] Putin or as his successor.”
Moreover, “Russian officials may be intending to use Fomin’s assassination to drive the self-censorship of a growing Russian civil society questioning the progress of the war in bars,” the US think tank wrote.
Russian pro-war blogger's killing an act of 'domestic terrorism': Ukrainian official
Meanwhile, Mykhailo Podolyak, an adviser to Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky, described the incident as “domestic terrorism”. He said in a tweet: “Spiders are eating each other in a jar.”
Monday is day 404 of Russia’s war on Ukraine.
(pm)
Source: PAP, ISW, The Guardian, BBC