Erasing Mariupol
The city of Mariupol came under siege by Russian troops for almost three months in 2022, and turned into a symbol for Ukrainian resistance and now also for Russian occupation. A team of three Associated Press reporters were the last international journalists to leave Mariupol, after almost three weeks of intense shelling.
Here is the story of Mariupol.
MARIUPOL, Ukraine (AP) — The bodies of the children all lie here, dumped into this narrow trench hastily dug into the frozen earth of Mariupol to the constant drumbeat of shelling.
MARIUPOL, Ukraine (AP) — The Russians were hunting us down. They had a list of names, including ours, and they were closing in.
KHARKIV, Ukraine (AP) — A celebrated Ukrainian medic recorded her time in Mariupol on a data card no bigger than a thumbnail, smuggled out to the world in a tampon.
LVIV, Ukraine (AP) — She stood in just her bathrobe in the freezing basement of the Mariupol theater, coated in white plaster dust shaken loose by the explosion. Her husband tugged at her to leave and begged her to cover her eyes.
NARVA, Estonia (AP) — For weeks Natalya Zadoyanova had lost contact with her younger brother Dmitriy, who was trapped in the besieged Ukrainian port city of Mariupol.
KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — As was his habit before each flight, the veteran Ukrainian army pilot ran a hand along the fuselage of his Mi-8 helicopter, caressing the heavy transporter’s metal skin to bring luck to him and his crew.
Olga Lopatkina paced around her basement in circles like a trapped animal. For more than a week, the Ukrainian mother had heard nothing from her six adopted children stranded in Mariupol, and she was going out of her mind with worry.
Throughout Mariupol, Russian workers are tearing down bombed-out buildings at a rate of at least one a day, hauling away shattered bodies with the debris.
Russian military convoys are rumbling down the broad avenues of what is swiftly becoming a garrison city, and Russian soldiers, builders, administrators and doctors are replacing the tens of thousands of Ukrainians who have died or left.
KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — The captive Ukrainian medic’s eyeglasses had long since been taken away, and the face of the Russian man walking past her was a blur.
Yuliia Paievska knew only that her life was being traded for his, and that she was leaving behind 21 women in a tiny three- by six-meter (10- by 20-foot) prison cell they had shared for what felt like an eternity. Her joy and relief was tempered by the sense that she was abandoning them to an uncertain fate.
Siege of Mariupol
AP videographer Mstyslav Chernov documented the Russian siege of Mariupol in the opening weeks of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. (AP Video/Mstyslav Chernov)
Mariupol’s Descent into Despair
A timeline of key moments during the Russian siege of Mariupol in the early weeks of the invasion of Ukraine. (AP Video/Mstyslav Chernov)
AP: Closer to 600 dead in Mariupol theater attack
The Russian airstrike on the theater in Mariupol on March 16 stands out as the single deadliest known attack against civilians to date. An Associated Press investigation analyzed what happened finding the attack killed closer to 600 people. (AP Video/ Marshall Ritzel)
Ukrainian medic is captured after documenting war
Ukrainian medic Yuliia Paievska, better known as Taira, strapped on a bodycam when the war broke out to show the world the unfolding horror in Mariupol. After an Associated Press team got her footage safely out, Russian forces took her captive. (AP Video/Serginho Roosblad)