Belarus' dictator says he talked Putin out of assassinating Prigozhin: 'Yes, we could take him out'

• Belarus' president said that he talked Vladimir Putin out of assassinating Yevgeny Prigozhin.
• "I told him: 'Don't do this,'" Alexander Lukashenko said in a speech on Tuesday.

Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko revealed that he talked Russian President Vladimir Putin out of assassinating Yevgeny Prigozhin, the Wagner Group founder and financier who incited an armed revolt against the Russian military leadership over the weekend.

Lukashenko confirmed on Tuesday that Prigozhin had arrived in Belarus from neighboring Russia as part of a deal struck over the weekend with Russian President Vladimir Putin, a fragile truce which saw the mercenary leader call off his short-lived rebellion in exchange for apparent exile.

"I said to Putin: 'Yes we could take him out, it wouldn't be a problem, if it doesn't work the first time, then the second,'" Lukashenko said in a speech Tuesday. "I told him: 'Don't do this,'" Lukashenko said duringa speech, a clip of which was shared to Twitter by Guardian reporter Shaun Walker.

Had Putin decided to follow through with this plan there wouldn't have been any negotiations, Lukashenko said, according to state-run media agency BelTA.

The months-long feud between Prigozhin and Russia's military leadership finally reached a boiling point on Friday when the Wagner leader accused Moscow of carrying out a deadly strike on his fighters somewhere in Ukraine. Enraged, Prigozhin blasted Russia's defense ministry as "evil" and immediately called for an armed rebellion.

Wagner fighters moved into Russia and captured the southern city of Rostov-on-Don before continuing north toward Moscow as the capital city readied its defenses. But before the mercenaries made it there, and after Russia lost a handful of aircraft during earlier fighting, Lukashenko helped broker a deal on Saturday to end the chaotic mutiny and send Prigozhin to Belarus.

Prigozhin finally broke his silence on Monday by expressing a certain degree of remorse for the downing of the Russian aircraft, although he did not specifically apologize for actually carrying out the mutiny. Later that day, Putin delivered a short and somewhat confusing speech in which he said traitors would be "brought to justice," casting doubt on the stability of the agreement and suggesting that the Wagner leader could face further consequences.

But on Tuesday, the FSB, Russia's state security apparatus, closed its criminal investigation into the mutiny. "Taking into account this and other circumstances relevant to the investigation, the investigative authority issued a resolution to terminate the criminal case on June 27," the FSB said, according to state media.