MARIUPOL – This is Azovstal. Piles of rubble, destroyed buildings, whistles of missiles and explosions. On the one hand, the Chechen flags. On the other, the chimneys of the steelworks from which huge clouds of black smoke caused by artillery shells rise. Down there is the last handful of a thousand Ukrainian soldiers. “Nazis – says the Chechen commander who accompanies us in this hell – we came here to drive them out”. This is the heart of the war in Ukraine. This is the battle of reckoning. Here the history of the conflict is decided. On the one hand, the Russians and their loyal armies. On the other, the Ukrainians aided by the West. Invisible ghosts, barricaded in the blocks of flats and tunnels of this huge industry but still able to shoot. Here we are still fighting. Stronger than ever. Everything is gray, the walls of the gutted warehouses gray and the sky above this battle gray. Smell of gunpowder envelops anyone who enters the Azovstal.
To get here it took several hours by car between destroyed or burned buildings, carcasses of military vehicles on the sides of the roads and dodging the corpses of soldiers abandoned on the ground. This is what one sees when entering Mariupol from its eastern entrance and approaching Azovstal, the large metallurgical production center that has become the last outpost of the Ukrainian army besieged by the Russians, the Chechens and the pro-Russian militias of the self-proclaimed Republic of Donetsk. For the soldiers of Kiev at these latitudes, the war is going badly. The city has been completely surrounded for weeks now and the Ukrainians have gradually withdrawn to barricade themselves in the steel plant, which until yesterday they claimed to have complete control. Today they can no longer do it. Two days ago the Chechens launched an attack to break through the enemy lines and in the night they managed to take over a large area of the steel mill. As soon as they arrived they planted their flags, red and green with the face of Ramzan Kadyrov, their leader, in the center. The message is clear: this area is ours. All around the war continues and does not seem to be able to end anytime soon.
To reach Azovstal you have to start from Novazovsk, a pro-Russian outpost east of Mariupol. From here, take a road lined with long lines of tents that house the displaced who fled the carpet bombing of the city center. On the other side of the road travel hundreds of cars whose windows are hung with white sheets. They are civilians fleeing a besieged city now reduced to a pile of rubble. Approaching the urban area you pass through villages made of houses with pointed roofs, which were once used for holidays by the upper middle class. Today they are completely deserted, destroyed. Almost no house, large or small, was spared by the bombs. As you advance, you immediately notice how the symbols of the now previous Ukrainian administration have been erased by those who attack. Russian flags fly over many buildings. On the sides of the road, endless rows of parked tanks meet, with men on board, their guns aimed at the city.
As soon as you enter the urban area of Mariupol you are stopped at a checkpoint. Not Russian, but Chechen. Dozens of men in military uniforms, Kalashnikovs in their hands and magazines hanging from flak jackets, check the territory. Their base is a small house on the side of the road, which they have made their own. Some are quite young, others are veterans who have already fought in the wars in Chechnya in the past decades. What they have in common are their long, unkempt beards, shaved only at the height of the mustache. “Ahmad Sila Allahu Akbar” is the motto with which one is greeted. They explain that from today it is possible to enter the Azovstal, but only with them and traveling on their military vehicles. They invite those who want to continue to get on a jeep riddled with bullets. “If we tell you, you can go on”. All around you can hear the sound of explosions coming from the steel mill. The wait lasts for hours. Then, suddenly, a young man with a long beard and an Islamic hat on his head emerges from the base: he gestures to continue.
Nothing remains of the eastern part of the city. The bombs did not spare any buildings, nor the villas nor the Soviet-style concrete blocks. They collapsed or heavily damaged, completely blackened. On the road there are carcasses of all kinds: of military vehicles, civilian cars, demolished restaurants, destroyed playgrounds. Above all, you don’t see a soul. No passers-by, no civilians. We only meet pro-Russian militiamen of the self-proclaimed Republic of Donetsk who along the road stand at checkpoints among the rubble on which the inevitable Russian flag often flies. Chechen military vehicles pass by unchecked. Turning right, you leave the paved road and enter muddy ground, while the barrels of the explosions are getting louder. The cars stop suddenly, the Chechen soldiers order them to get out and walk quickly at the foot of a destroyed building, to take shelter. The walls are completely broken down. Looking up, at the level of the first floor we see two with long beards and military clothes. Above them the Chechen flag flies. On the ground floor of the building, visible from the outside since the walls have been broken down, some soldiers always with long beards have placed Kalashnikovs on the ground and sit around an improvised bonfire. All around other uniformed militiamen move in the mud, walking quickly and along the walls to avoid being exposed to the fire. One of them approaches and says: “Here we are in the Azovstal, here we are”.
Azovstal is a real city within a city. With an area of 11 square kilometers, it is made up of containers, warehouses, underground tunnels, offices, apartment blocks, towers, chimneys. It is a very difficult place to conquer, not surprisingly chosen by the Ukrainian resistance as the last bastion. A few hours earlier, however, they managed to break through the enemy lines and take control of a part of them, made up of skeletons of destroyed apartment blocks that once housed the administration of the complex. The production area, or the actual steel mill itself, is located a few kilometers further on and is still in Ukrainian hands.
“Ahmad Sila” someone shouts in the air. “Allahu Akbar” answer the bearded soldiers in chorus. To have screamed first is a man dressed completely in black, if not for the green insignia depicting the face of Kadyrov that he wears on his arm. He has an Islamic headdress and a long gray beard on his head. He is Commander Adam Sultanovic Delimhanov, a deputy in the Duma and right-hand man of Kadyrov. He is here to direct military operations. Entering the building he takes out a map which he places on an improvised table and explains the movements of his men inside the steel mill. He says the fight last night was tough and that he saw the Chechens clash directly with the Azov regiment. “Nazis – he exclaims – we came here to eliminate Nazism from Ukraine”. He says that the Ukrainians are a few hundred meters away but that they are now completely surrounding and that they have no escape. He suggests that it is only a matter of time, sooner or later they will give up because they are defeated or because they are exhausted. According to him, the Kiev army still has a thousand operational men at its disposal, including foreign fighters. When asked about who they are, however, he does not say too much.
Going up the stairs of the building you meet other bearded men. Some are standing and well armed, while others are bivouacking on the ground, with their weapons and belts resting alongside. They try to rest, while next to them the snipers guard the windows. But sleeping is impossible. All around you can hear nothing but barrels. Arriving at the top floor of the building you look out over the Azovstal in its entirety. On the right, the area controlled by the Chechens, in which there was fighting the night before and in which not a single building remains standing. Soldiers walk among the rubble carrying supplies to the fighters: bags of food and water bowls. Turning your gaze to the left you can see the industrial complex where the Ukrainians are. The towers of the steel mill are constantly under fire, in just a few minutes you can see repeatedly the dust of black cloud, a sign of the bombing. In addition to the barrels, you can hear the whistles of the missiles and the firing of the machine guns, a sign that the two armies are clashing man to man. Descending again, you quickly get into the car and set off again. Before leaving, a militiaman explains that in Azovstal the Chechens are not alone but that they are joined by Russians and pro-Russians. But it is evident that they are the ones who carry the greatest weight. A missile falls a few hundred meters away with a strong explosion, so you have to go. Starting off, the greeting of those who remain at the front is always the same: “Ahmad Sila Allahu Akbar”.