Mariupol is under the control of pro-Russian forces, except for the Azovstal factory, where several hundred fighters are entrenched. On the spot, evacuations of civilians, including many women and children, took place. Some have already returned to Mariupol, but others are still in the camp in the city of Bezimmen, just a few kilometers from the exit of Mariupol in the direction of Russia. Meeting with Piotr.
With our special correspondent in Bezimmen, Anissa El Jabri
The camp is located along the road that runs along the coast; about twenty white and bright blue tents, you can’t miss them.
To enter, you have to show your credentials to the soldiers who stand guard. And inside circulate, between two gusts of wind coming from the sea: the personnel of the humanitarian aid services, but also the soldiers.
Gone are the days when evacuees from Mariupol could queue for several days in their car to enter, when more than 600 people were accommodated there. Today the flow has dried up. Women, men and children, they are about 150.
Among them: Piotr, 32, construction worker, arrived two weeks ago with his wife.
I ended up here completely by accident. I was living in a basement and we had nothing left to eat. The neighbors told us that there was a place where we could get humanitarian aid, not too far. I went there and there I was offered to get out of Mariupol. So we left. There is nothing more to do there, there is no work, and it was still dangerous.
Except that without identity papers – they burned, he says – and with his 32 years, the age to fight, Piotr presents a profile deemed potentially suspicious. Which earned him an investigation.
They distrust everyone until the age of 60. And also because I was undocumented. I could very well have been a soldier who threw away his military ID and said he was a civilian.
Photos, fingerprints, then five days in a men’s cell. His wife ? In the one for women. And many questions.
Do you have acquaintances in the Ukrainian army? What do you think of the Ukrainian government? What do you think of this whole situation? I said that I was totally apolitical, that I didn’t even watch the news. Honestly, I didn’t watch the news until this whole thing started on February 24th. I used to watch movies on cable. At work, I was working, that’s all. I wasn’t interested in politics at all. Most people in Mariupol are like that. They just work. Politics doesn’t interest them.
They also look at the fingers to check that there is no trace of powder. Then they check for gun butt marks on the shoulders, then they check for tattoos, to see if there are any Nazi symbols. Those who have Nazi symbols, they are the first to be arrested. They have lists, they look at passports. I had no identity papers, but they found me in their database, just with my passport number. I did not arouse suspicion and they let me go. Anyway, they have a lot of things in their databases, military lists. But above all, they pay attention to traces of rifle butts and Nazi symbols, tattoos. Oh and they also look at messages on phones, social networks, Telegram groups…
Those who arouse suspicion are set aside, destination prison, it is said here. The fates of those, Piotr does not speak about it. He keeps busy as he can and rereads the three books he brought with him. He is waiting, he says, for a peace agreement between the two parties, to choose in which country he wants to live.
►Read also: Meeting with an evacuee from Mariupol in the camp in the city of Bezimmen