The Wagner Center in St. Petersburg (file photo)
MOSCOW -- The Russian mercenary group Wagner has placed advertisements on Pornhub, the world’s largest pornographic website, as it tries to recruit fighters to reinforce its troops fighting as part of the Kremlin's war against Ukraine.
Those who enter the pornographic site from Russia without using a VPN and programs blocking ads will see a Wagner video calling on the viewer to join Wagner instead of enjoying pornography.
The expletive-laced text says that Wagner is looking for recruits "from all Russian regions."
In one part of the risque ad, a woman can be seen twirling a lollipop in her mouth while a female voice in the background refers to Wagner as the "coolest f**king private army in the world."
Wagner's co-founder and owner Yevgeny Prigozhin confirmed that the ad was placed on Pornhub’s website.
"The placement of the ad on porn websites is the good idea of our marketing experts. I fully agree with them. The ad says: Go fight along with Wagner private military campaign, stop masturbating. And who disagrees with that?" Prigozhin’s statement placed on Telegram said.
Wagner is a mercenary group co-founded by the Kremlin-linked Prigozhin, who has been known under the nickname "Putin's chef" because of his company's catering operations for Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Members of the mercenary group, with thousands of men recruited from correctional institutions across Russia, have been actively involved in Russia's ongoing unprovoked invasion of Ukraine launched in February last year.
Last week, Prigozhin said his troops along with all of the Russian forces involved in the fierce monthslong fight to take the eastern Ukrainian city of Bakhmut are suffering from shortages of ammunition.
Last month, Prigozhin said Wagner stopped recruiting inmates, while the Defense Ministry has itself reportedly begun in its own recruiting campaign in Russian penitentiaries.
Several countries have recognized Wagner as a terrorist organization.
This week, Russia's parliament approved a bill that expanded penalties for those considered to have discredited Russia's troops to include comments about mercenary groups and volunteers fighting in Ukraine.
Authorities have used the laws to hand down lengthy jail sentences to longtime Kremlin critics.
