The funeral took place away from the glare of the media and in stark contrast to the brazen, self-publicising style with which Prigozhin had fanned his reputation far beyond Russia for ruthlessness and ambition.

The crash came two months after Prigozhin and his Wagner mercenaries staged a mutiny against Russian military commanders in which they took control of a southern city, Rostov, and advanced towards Moscow.

Now with Prigozhin believed dead, the fate of the complex, lucrative web of military and commercial operations he and Wagner created for Russia across Europe, the Middle East and Africa hangs in the balance.

Breaking his silence, Putin described Prigozhin as a talented businessman whom he had known since the 1990s and said the investigation into the crash would take time.

Prigozhin's death would leave the Wagner Group leaderless and raise questions about its future operations in Africa and elsewhere.

Prigozhin says he launched the mutiny to save his group after being ordered to place it under command of the defence ministry.

Wagner boss Yevgeny Prigozhin had earlier defended his aborted mutiny as a bid to save his mercenary outfit and expose the failures of Russia's military leadership – but not to challenge the Kremlin.

Prigozhin renewed an allegation, that the Russian military had attacked a Wagner camp, killing about 30 of its men, and said this had been the immediate trigger for what he called a 'march of justice'.