A small island of territory, the Azovstal steelworks, remained under Ukrainian control. For weeks, Ivantsov and his fellow soldiers had lived in a network of underground shelters, shared with a few civilians. Now this grim subterranean existence was coming to an end.
The complex's food supplies had run out. Russian bombs fell continuously. There was no prospect of escape. Vladimir Putin had ordered a blockade so tight "that a fly can't get through". Under pressure from Kyiv the Ukrainian garrison, composed of 2,500 service personnel, some of them gravely wounded, had reluctantly agreed to surrender. The alternative was certain death.
Or was it? As his battalion prepared to go into Russian captivity, Ivantsov came up with an extraordinary plan. "I decided to hide," he said. Instead of surrendering he would disappear, and take his chances, in the hope he could somehow make it back to Ukrainian-controlled territory many miles away. "I put the probability of success at one in 1,000," the 29-year-old admitted.
"Everyone thought I was mad." He explained: "I understood that the Russians would consider me a traitor. That meant my treatment would be worse."
Ivantsov grew up in the city of Luhansk in the east of Ukraine, close to the Russian border. A pro-Ukraine activist, he fled in 2014 when Russia covertly occupied the Donbas region in what was a precursor to the full-scale invasion that began in 2022.
Diese Geschichte stammt aus der January 10, 2024-Ausgabe von The Guardian.
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