Putin Rebukes Wagner, Biden on Putin, Nevada Lithium Mine

We don't do that.

Oh, okay.

Russian President Vladimir Putin broke his silence after a mutiny led by his one-time

ally.

But is this over?

President Biden also spoke about Russia after a weekend of silence.

The U.S. and NATO allies didn't want to get involved or be blamed.

A NATO summit on Russia's doorstep comes in a couple weeks.

near sacred sites.

Mining companies say a lot of lithium is needed to meet demand for electric vehicles and renewable

energy.

So stay with us.

We'll give you the news you need to start your day.

On the TED Radio Hour, MIT psychologist Sherry Turkle.

Her latest research into the intimate relationships people are having with chatbots.

Technologies that say, I care about you, I love you, I'm here for you, take care of me.

The pros and cons of artificial intimacy.

That's on the TED Radio Hour from NPR.

Two presidents are talking of a mutiny in Russia.

We'll hear him in a moment.

Russia's Vladimir Putin also fell silent for a couple of days.

But then he gave a speech about the private military contractors who briefly marched toward

Moscow.

Yevgeny Prigozhin, the head of the Wagner Group, called off his advance and accepted

exile in Belarus.

Hi, Charles.

the fate of Russia.

The spokesman now says he never used those words.

Either way, this address seemed less about the future of the country and more about Putin

reasserting control, placing himself back at the center of events.

The Russian leader was visibly still angry about the uprising, denouncing the leaders

of the insurrection as criminals, but making clear that he, Putin, had been firmly in charge

the whole time.

Let's listen.

So here Putin says that from the very outset of events, he gave direct orders that steps

should be taken to minimize bloodshed, but that had required time, mainly for the Wagner

fighters to realize the mistake they'd made and the futility of the uprising.

Now, Putin also said this deal for Wagner, this amnesty initially brokered by the leader

of Belarus, was in fact Putin's idea of Wagner fighters.

Putin said now had a choice.

They could sign up with the military, go home to their families, or choose exile in Belarus,

where Wagner's leader, Yevgeny Prigozhin, as Putin's former ally who led the rebellion

and who the president did not mention by name in his speech, has also been offered

safe passage.

Has he taken the deal?

Do we know where he is?

Belarusian media today reported that a plane believed to be used by Prigozhin landed in

Minsk, the capital of Belarus, this morning.

Also Russia's federal security services, the FSB, announced this morning they dropped this

insurrection charge against Prigozhin and the rest of the Wagner fighters.

The question now seems to be whether Prigozhin will keep his end of whatever bargain he made

with Putin.

Yesterday, Prigozhin issued a mea culpa on social media in which he basically said this

was all a big misunderstanding, that Wagner was protesting a decision that would put them

under the authority of the defense ministry leadership, a leadership they consider incompetent,

but they had never had any desire to overthrow the government or challenge the Russian leader.

So is all this really over at this point?

Prigozhin and the military leadership amid the war in Ukraine.

Lost in all the political intrigue here is the fact that as many as 15 Russian servicemen

were killed in fighting between Wagner and the army as Prigozhin's mercenaries led this

Mad Max style run on Moscow Saturday.

Also the initial reason for all this, these Wagner allegations of incompetence by the

top brass are still out there left to fester.

In his comments yesterday, Prigozhin said, the ease of Wagner's move into Russia, seizing

a major city in the South and then moving on to the Capitol was all the proof you needed.

And yet President Putin met with his top security officials, including the defense minister

Sergei Shoigu, who's been on the receiving end of Prigozhin's ire this whole time and

basically told them job well done.

And actually the Kremlin seems to be pushing the idea that this whole episode is in a way

something to celebrate, that Russia's enemies wanted the country to descend into civil war

and instead Russians had come together and stopped it.

You know, they passed the test when it mattered most.

Charles, thank you.

was over.

We had to make sure we gave Putin no excuse.

We gave Putin no excuse to blame this on the West and to blame this on NATO.

NPR's White House correspondent Franco Ordoñez was listening and he's here with us now.

Hi, Franco. Hi, Leila.

So what did you learn?

David during all this action was happening.

You know, he said he was getting hour by hour updates from his national security team and

that he directed them to prepare for a range of scenarios.

He didn't go into details, though.

And he also said that it's too early to draw any conclusions about the lasting impacts,

but that his team continues to assess the fallout.

And as you noted at the top, the key message he wanted to deliver and he wanted to deliver

it to cameras was that the United States had nothing to do with Russia's troubles and that

this was an internal struggle with the Russian system.

wasn't perceived to have been involved?

alluding to an investigation of Western involvement.

But what this really seems to be about is wanting to kind of stay out of a very fraught

situation. I spoke to Andrea Kendall Taylor, who advised the Biden transition team on

Russian policy. You know, she says Biden was making it clear to Putin that the

Biden administration was not going to try to exploit this incident for its gain.

Russia, that the United States will seek to use instability to try to break up the

Russian state and to keep Russia down.

misunderstanding that could spiral out of control.

And there is another audience here, and that's the rest of the world.

Kendall Taylor says the White House is trying to counter that narrative that the U.S.

likes to meddle in the domestic affairs of other countries.

And that's something that Russia and China like to promote.

that it does show Russia's military is not as vaunted as the Kremlin likes to make it

out to be. But he also cautioned that, you know, those who are trying to predict Putin's

demise, he noted that Putin still commands a very large and capable military and tens of

thousands of Russian troops are still fighting in Ukraine and fighting very vigorously.

towards Moscow is key in the fighting in Ukraine for Russia.

Did the White House say anything about what this means for Ukraine and also for Russia's

out, but it will be clearly an important item discussed at next month's NATO summit.

And it also raises some concerns about instability in Russia, a lot of concerns, which is

always a big deal when dealing with a nuclear power.

It also point out that the White House says it remains committed to Ukraine and that

there will be another financial package for Ukraine announced later this week.

Thank you so much. Thanks, Laila.

Lawyers for tribes in the American West are in court today.

It's designed to dig up a strategic metal on federal land that the tribes consider sacred

approved the mine. But the Biden administration wants the mine, too, right?

left office. Lithium is considered a strategic mineral by the U.S.

It's also needed for electric vehicle batteries, among other things.

And a lot of it we have to import right now.

But as you say, the mine is on ancestral land, federal public land, but land considered

sacred by West Coast Paiutes.

It's believed to be near and adjacent to and on the site of a ancient massacre of West

Coast Paiutes by the U.S.

cavalry back to 1865.

One of the tribes that has been bringing the court challenges is the Reno Sparks Indian

Colony. And their chairman, Arlen Melendez, told me that once again, in his words, Native

people are being asked to get out of the way for American progress.

as far as those sacred sites.

mine. This latest appeal occurs here in California this morning.

saying? Right.

So there has been some initial construction by a company called Lithium Americas and

specifically Lithium Nevada.

They've declined an interview request by NPR citing today's court hearing.

But, you know, they've maintained that they have followed all of the environmental laws

required. And they're partnering with one local tribe that is actually in favor of this

mine, the Fort McDermott and Shoshone tribe.

And they're planning to hire workers from the local tribes.

I mean, the argument here basically, Leila, is that no energy development comes without

some impacts. And if you're going to make this whole scale transition and try to

transform our energy grid, you know, lithium's needed for EV batteries.

You're going to need mining of some sort.

And I talked to Corby Anderson about this.

He's a metallurgist at the Colorado School of Mines.

Do we wait ad infinitum?

Meanwhile, there's these stakes in the ground to create electric vehicles and require

their use. Yeah, we're going to have to go somewhere to get the lithium.

without this mine, which, by the way, would be the largest lithium mine in America.

But we'd have to continue to go abroad to countries like China and other nations that

are seen as hostile toward the U.S.

And we've all been through the pandemic and seen the supply chain disruptions.

And so the backers are saying we need this mine.

I'm Leila Falden. And I'm Steve Inskeep.

Perez. Our editors are Alice Wolfley, Michael Sullivan, Roberta Rampton, and Eric

Whitney. Our technical director is Zach Coleman with engineering support from Carly

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