As Kommersant learned, the capital’s courts refused to pay compensation in the amount of 15 million rubles. the widow of a volunteer who died in the Northern Military District. Her husband, a native of Kyrgyzstan, was convicted in Russia of a serious crime, left the colony to become an attack aircraft and died during the liberation of Artemovsk. The courts decided that the defendants – the military department, Sogaz and LLC, on behalf of which the contract was allegedly concluded with the prisoner – have nothing to do with the PMC, and the Wagners structure itself has an “uncertain legal status.”
From the documents published on the official website of the Moscow City Court, it follows that Almakan Ergeshova, the widow of a volunteer who died in the SVO zone, filed a claim against the Ministry of Defense, Sogaz JSC as an insurer and Concord Management and Consulting LLC in the Meshchansky District Court back in February 2024. Her husband, citizen of Kyrgyzstan Aman Aidraliev, born in 1982, at one time went to work in the Kaluga region, where in 2019 he was convicted by the Lyudinovsky District Court of causing grievous bodily harm, negligently resulting in the death of the victim (Part 4 of Article 111 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation). In August 2022, the prisoner voluntarily joined the Wagner PMC, underwent training, and in September found himself in the combat zone in the DPR. In October, he stopped communicating, his relatives began searching and even turned to the head of the PMC, Yevgeny Prigozhin. As a result, the grave of the attack aircraft was found on the “Wagner Alley” in the cemetery in the village of Fryanovo near Moscow (Shchelkovo urban district). It turned out that he died on October 24, 2022 in the battles for Artemovsk and was posthumously awarded the medal “For Courage.”
The widow in the lawsuit, which began to be considered in March 2024, noted that during a “short telephone conversation” before being sent to the PMC, her husband told her that he had “concluded a contract with Concord Management and Consulting LLC.” The representative of Mrs. Ergeshova in court demanded to establish the fact of her husband’s participation in hostilities as part of a volunteer formation and to recover compensation in favor of the widow of the deceased: 3 million rubles. from the Ministry of Defense, 4.6 million rubles. a one-time benefit from Sogaz as an insurer, as well as 5.1 million one-time compensation from Concord. She also demanded 350 thousand rubles from the last company. for each month of participation in battles and 2 million rubles. compensation for moral damage. “The news of the death of her closest person came as a shock, a terrible grief, she was overwhelmed by a feeling of injustice and the absurdity of what had happened; with the loss of her husband, the plaintiff suffered an irreparable loss,” the case file says. The court did not question the very facts of the death and award of the Kyrgyz citizen.
All defendants categorically disagreed with the plaintiff’s demands.
Representatives of Sogaz explained to the court that the Wagner PMC “does not belong to the volunteer formations” that were created by the Ministry of Defense or the Russian National Guard.
They recalled that “this unit” did not become part of the Ministry of Defense, and its fighters did not enter into agreements with it. Accordingly, insured events involving them do not fall under the responsibility of the military department insurer.
A representative of Concord Management and Consulting indicated at court hearings that the company operates in the fields of construction, trade, food, etc., and is not a PMC. The LLC did not enter into any agreements on participation in the SVO with individuals, legal entities, or the Ministry of Defense. Therefore, the company has never made and does not make any accruals or payments to anyone in connection with participation in volunteer formations,” the court documents note.
Let us note that the widow did not submit her husband’s contract to the court.
To the court’s request, a response was received from the National Defense Management Center of the Russian Federation, which stated that since the beginning of the special military operation, “due to military necessity,” “structures with an uncertain legal status were involved in it.” But since the summer of 2023, PMC Wagner, one of these organizations, ceased to exist.
The plaintiff tried to connect Wagner and Concord Management and Consulting with references to the fact that the company, through Voentorg, earned government funds by supplying food products and providing nutrition services to the army. However, the defendants found 2,782 organizations on the Internet with a name containing the word “Concord.” It was also not possible in court to tie the PMC and the company to each other by mentioning Yevgeny Prigozhin as the general director and founder.
As a result of a year and a half consideration of the case, judge Alexey Gorodilov in August 2025 sided with the defendants. “From the literal interpretation of the above rules of law, it follows that PMC employees are not included in the list of persons entitled to receive additional social guarantees when participating in hostilities,” the decision says, which also notes that PMCs are essentially a non-state armed formation. Therefore, payments due in connection with the death of PMC participants are paid by the company itself “in accordance with the terms of the concluded contracts.”
At the same time, the court expressed doubt that the Wagner PMC did not fulfill its obligations to the family of the deceased, especially since the widow did not acquire inheritance rights either in Russia or in her homeland in Kyrgyzstan.
The decision of the Meshchansky Court was appealed to the Moscow City Court, but unsuccessfully. On May 25 this year it came into force.
“When working with clients, Sogaz acts exclusively within the legal framework and executes all court decisions that have entered into legal force,” the insurance company told Kommersant. The Ministry of Defense was unable to promptly obtain comments; the LLC presented them exhaustively in court.
