Outsourcing war: Holding Russia and its African partners accountable for Wagner’s crimes

Since 2017, Russian private military companies such as Wagner, and now its successor, Africa Corps, have become a fixture of Africa’s security landscape. These shadow armies have trained local troops, guarded oilfields and gold mines, and helped African strongmen cling to power. In return, Moscow has secured lucrative mining concessions and geopolitical influence across the continent.

Following the deaths of Wagner leaders Yevgeny Prigozhin and Dmitri Utkin in 2023, the Kremlin rebranded the organisation under the more sanitised name Africa Corps, a formation directly tied to Russia’s Ministry of Defence. But little has changed beyond the logo. The same personnel, tactics and business interests continue to operate under Russian oversight, now with even less accountability.

Wagner’s record in Africa is brutal. Human Rights Watch and UN investigators have documented systematic atrocities: torture, arbitrary detention, massacres, and indiscriminate attacks on civilians in Mali, the Central African Republic (CAR), Sudan, Libya and Mozambique. In March 2022, Malian and Wagner fighters executed hundreds of civilians in the village of Moura. Similar atrocities have occurred in the CAR, where Wagner operatives occupy senior government and security positions.

African governments tolerate this in exchange for regime protection and weapons, while Russia gains both profit and power. The result is a grim trade-off: short-term stability purchased with long-term impunity.

Dismantling the myth of deniability

Moscow and its African partners often argue that Wagner is a “private” actor beyond state control. But new research I have published with Matthew Kimble argues that international law says otherwise. The International Law Commission’s Articles on Responsibility of States for Internationally Wrongful Acts (ARSIWA) make clear that states can be held liable for the actions of private entities acting under their authority or control.

Under Article 4, when Wagner or Africa Corps personnel act with apparent official capacity, training soldiers, guarding government facilities, policing civilians, their conduct is attributable to the host state. The fact they are foreign contractors does not matter if they act “under colour of authority”.

Article 5 goes further. When states delegate core public functions, such as detention, interrogation or combat, to private actors, they cannot evade responsibility. Authorising Wagner to perform these tasks in Mali or the CAR therefore triggers state liability.

Even if these operatives exceed their orders, Article 7 holds that states remain responsible for acts committed while “cloaked with government authority”. In short, persistent patterns of abuse put states on notice, activating their legal duty to prevent violations.

Article 8 covers situations where states direct, fund or supervise private military operations. Russia’s deep financial, logistical and command links with Wagner easily meet the “overall control” threshold established by international courts.

In failed or fragile states, Article 9 applies when private military companies step into the void of public administration, effectively replacing the state. In the CAR, Wagner’s assumption of customs and policing functions fits this description.

Finally, Article 11 makes clear that when a government endorses or benefits from such conduct, it adopts that behaviour as its own. Public statements from Malian and CAR officials defending Wagner’s role demonstrate this endorsement.

Together, these provisions create a clear legal pathway to attribute Wagner’s and Africa Corps’ atrocities both to the territorial states that hire them and to Russia, which organises, equips and commands them.

The responsibility of all states

Most of Wagner’s victims are nationals of the very governments that invited these contractors in. That means justice will not come from domestic courts. But international law provides another route.

Under Article 48 of the ARSIWA, any state can invoke responsibility when a breached obligation is owed to the international community as a whole.

This opens the door to what scholars call communitarian state responsibility – where third-party states act collectively to enforce universal norms. Recent cases before the International Court of Justice (ICJ), such as The Gambia v Myanmar over the Rohingya genocide and South Africa v Israel over Gaza, illustrate how non-injured states can litigate on behalf of humanity.

Applied to Wagner, this means any state, African or otherwise, could bring proceedings before the ICJ against both the Russian Federation and the African governments that employ these forces. They could seek cessation of abuses, reparations for victims, and guarantees of non-repetition.

Why the international community should care

The Wagner–Africa Corps model represents a dangerous convergence of authoritarianism, resource exploitation and privatised warfare. Western sanctions and asset freezes against Wagner-linked entities have barely dented operations. As the group expands under the Africa Corps banner, this model risks becoming the new normal in African security policy.

That is why a stronger, law-based international response is needed. States should bring cases before the ICJ invoking communitarian responsibility on behalf of victims. They should tie aid, trade, and security cooperation to the non-employment of private military companies implicated in atrocities. They can mandate adherence to the Montreux Document and International Code of Conduct for Private Security Providers before awarding security contracts. They can also suspend regional and peacekeeping privileges for governments employing abusive private military companies.

Such steps would align with Africa’s own legal traditions. The African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights already demands that states prevent, investigate, and punish abuses within their jurisdiction, even when committed by private actors. Turning a blind eye to Wagner’s actions violates that obligation.

Accountability cannot be outsourced

The rise of private military companies like Wagner and Africa Corps has blurred the boundary between state and non-state warfare. But under international law, responsibility cannot be outsourced. The ARSIWA provides the legal architecture for attributing these abuses to both hiring and home states, and it empowers the broader international community to act, through courts, diplomacy, and sanctions, when universal norms are breached.

If the rule of law is to mean anything in modern conflict, states must be held accountable for the actions of their proxies. Employing private military companies cannot be a licence for impunity. Otherwise, Africa risks becoming a testing ground for the next generation of deniable wars.