MELITOPOL, January 24. /TASS/. Vladimir Rogov, chairman of the We Are Together with Russia civil society group, on Tuesday told TASS that Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky and CIA Director William Burns spoke about assassinating Yevgeny Prigozhin, founder of the Wagner private military company, when the top US spy visited Kiev last week.

"One of the requests that was voiced by Zelensky was to kill the head of the private military company Wagner. Mr. Prigozhin," Rogov said. "Prigozhin is effective, and his killing would make a lot of sense, given the media component and how they spin their victories. Zelensky’s inner circle and a fairly large number of people are aware of this request to ask, and even demand, that the Americans kill Prigozhin. That doesn’t require lists, more sanctions - all that doesn’t work anyway, especially with respect to people who don’t have assets there. Show that the most brazen person, the most colorful subject of media reports must be killed."

US National Security Council Coordinator for Strategic Communications John Kirby on January 20 said the US would designate the Wagner company as a "transnational criminal organization" and would soon impose more sanctions on the entity. The US earlier already subjected the company to its sanctions.

Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Monday that Washington’s designation of the Wagner company would hardly affect the organization and Russia.