Yevgeny Prigozhin, the head of the Wagner mercenary force that mutinied in Russia on Saturday, has issued an 11-minute audio file in his first message since halting a march on Moscow.
He said the march on Moscow showed 'very serious' security problems in Russia but he denied he had wanted to overthrow the government.
The aim, he said, was to save his embattled mercenary outfit and not ousting the Russian authorities.
"We went to demonstrate our protest and not to overthrow power in the country.
Prigozhin says Wagner had support in all the towns it went through during its action.
"In Russian towns, civilians met us with Russian flags and the symbols of Wagner," Prigozhin said. "They were all happy when we passed through."
Wagner troops on Saturday captured Russia's southern military headquarters near the border with Ukraine and started heading for Moscow before turning back, with Prigozhin saying he did not want Russians fighting Russians.
Moscow later said it would drop treason charges against Prigozhin and his followers, and that Prigozhin was going to Belarus.
His current location is unknown.
Prigozhin said the Belarus president had offered ways how the Wagner group could continue to operate.
"Lukashenko held out his hand and offered to find solutions for the continuation of the work of the Wagner private military company in a legal jurisdiction," he said.
Wagner HQ operating normally despite mutiny
On Monday, the headquarters of the mercenary group said it was continuing to work in "normal mode."
"Despite events that have taken place, the centre continues to work in normal mode in accordance to the law of the Russian Federation," the office, based in Russia's second city of Saint Petersburg, said.
It said Wagner has "worked for the future of Russia" and thanked its supporters.
Wagner, whose very existence Moscow denied until its Ukraine offensive, said it had "created opportunities for the (self) realisation of talented people from all over the country".
It said that on top of developing "domestic drones", it had also worked on "preparing information fighters and countering the information war".
Prigozhin is known to have led an infamous troll farm in Saint Petersburg.
Despite Putin calling the Wagner mutiny "treason" and warning of civil war, some of the group's offices around Russia were still recruiting fighters, Russian media reported.
The TASS state news agency said Wagner recruitment reopened in Siberia's Novosibirsk and Tyumen.
"Recruitment is ongoing," TASS quoted a Wagner worker in Novosibirsk as saying.
In the Duma -- Russia's lower house of parliament -- however, lawmakers said the group could no longer recruit convicts.
Prigozhin had recruited thousands of Russian prisoners to fight in Ukraine, promising an amnesty upon their return if they survive.
"There was a time when (Wagner) could take those who were convicted and sign a contract with them," senior lawmaker Pavel Krasheninnikov said, according to the Interfax news agency.
"Now the law says there is a different procedure, under which contracts can only be signed with the defence ministry."