 Russian Defence Ministry is reinforcing Wagner rights to capture Barkhmut. Despite the fact that there is infighting between the Russian Defence Ministry and Yevgeny Prigozin, the founder of the Wagner Group, Wagner militants are being reinforced with modern means to capture the city of Barkhmut. The US-based Institute for the Study of War announced it. The report points out that the news of the reassignment of Russian Airborne Commander Mikhail Teplinsky indicates that the Russian Defence Ministry is seeking to work more closely with the Wagner Group to complete the capture of Barkhmut, despite the obvious tensions between Prigozin and the Defence Ministry leadership. In addition, experts say Prigozin has also reduced his outspoken attacks on the Defence Ministry in recent days. Russian military bloggers also report that Wagner's forces are using T-90 tanks in Barkhmut, indicating that the Russian leadership has provided the group with more modern means to capture the city. Experts point out that the Russian military command appears to be increasingly shifting responsibility for offensive operations in Ukraine to the Russian airborne forces. According to experts, it is unlikely that Teplinsky will be able to restore the previous status of the airborne forces as an elite unit due to the significant losses in Ukraine. Widespread losses to previously elite units that are now being restaffed with poorly trained mobilised personnel are likely to have long-term impacts on the combat effectiveness of these units and the replacement of a single commander is highly unlikely to be able to solve such pervasive damage, the report reads. Experts also note that Wagner's group released 130 Ukrainian prisoners of war on the 16th of April, which suggests that Wagner could have carried out the exchange independently of the Russian Defence Ministry. The report suggests that Wagner's group may be trying to force mobilised Russian servicemen to sign contracts with Wagner, possibly in an effort to compensate for losses in Ukraine. As an example, experts cite the fact that conscripts from Moscow and Ivanovo oblasts of the Russian Federation in a public complaint published on the 16th of April claim that the Wagner group forced 170 mobilised servicemen to sign contracts with it. Earlier, Russian sources claimed that 100 conscripts in Luhansk oblast disappeared on the 7th of April after refusing to sign contracts with Wagner.