Since 2018, mercenaries from Russia's Wagner Group, an effective secret army of the Kremlin, have been active in Central African Republic. They protect the impoverished country's regime in exchange for valuable mineral resources and deploy a massive propaganda campaign to cover up the massacres, rapes and torture they are accused of. Taking advantage of France's loss of influence in its former colony, Russia is seen to be using Central African Republic – a country ripped apart by decades of civil war – as a testing ground in a new battle for global influence. FRANCE 24's Carol Valade and Clément Di Roma report.

This documentary won the 2022 Daphne Caruana Galizia Prize for Journalism, awarded by the European Parliament.The Prize pays tribute to Daphne Caruana Galizia, a Maltese anti-corruption investigative journalist and blogger who was killed in a car bomb attack in 2017. The annual award recognises outstanding journalism that promotes or defends the core principles and values of the European Union such as human dignity, freedom, democracy, equality, rule of law and human rights.

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