Warning: This text incorporates descriptions of graphic scenes.
A bullet fired by a Russian sniper hit Azov Brigade member Artem Dubyna within the head and handed via his neck. "He's useless," crackled the message over the radio to his comrades.
However Dubyna's coronary heart was nonetheless beating.
Evacuating his unconscious physique from the spot the place he was shot — contained in the Azovstal metal plant, Ukraine's remaining stronghold throughout the Russian siege of Mariupol within the spring of 2022 — was almost inconceivable amid relentless Russian bombardment.
As he started to indicate faint indicators of life, his comrades launched a daring effort to rescue him. With a Russian sniper nonetheless watching the world, Ukrainian mortar groups deployed smoke rounds to cloak the place, offering simply sufficient cowl to hold out the evacuation.
"I spent three days in a coma (in a makeshift hospital in Azovstal)," Dubyna, 38, says. "I skilled a whole lack of reminiscence. I didn't bear in mind who I used to be or the place I used to be."
Although he survived and progressively regained his reminiscence, returning to function a press officer for Azov — an emblem of Ukraine's resistance via its tenacious protection of Mariupol within the first three months of the full-scale battle — the nightmare was removed from over.
On Could 16, 2022, Azovstal defenders have been ordered to give up to the encircling Russian forces. Precisely three years in the past, on Could 20, 2022, the give up concluded. Dubyna, together with a whole bunch of different troopers, was despatched into Russian captivity, the place he spent two and a half years.
Although 485 Azovstal defenders have been launched from captivity since 2022, round 850 stay in Russian prisons three years later. The total extent of what occurred in Azovstal and Mariupol could solely come to mild when each defender is free to share their story.
Nonetheless, the way in which Ukrainian troopers defended the plant, regardless of accidents, exhaustion, and extreme shortages of ammunition and even meals, has already gone down in historical past as one of the crucial heroic navy operations up to now.
The final battle
Dubyna, who goes by the callsign "Nikopol," after his hometown, joined Azov as a press officer in 2016. He left navy service round 2020 to return to journalism, hoping to calm down and construct a household.
However simply two years later, as an alternative of the calm life he'd hoped to construct, Dubyna discovered himself again in uniform and straight into hell: Mariupol, on the middle of the battle's most brutal early battles.
"We understood that this may be a siege, and that we'd face a big focus of enemy forces. However we additionally knew that the longer we held Mariupol, the extra enemy forces could be tied down there, and people in surrounding cities (like Zaporizhzhia) would have time to organize (for additional assaults)," Dubyna remembers.
As Russian troops superior on Mariupol, Ukrainian defenders have been pushed additional again, with Azovstal — an enormous metal plant that includes in depth underground tunnels — in the end serving as their remaining bastion.
"I had misplaced a number of blood, however there was no solution to give me a transfusion or fluids, so my physique needed to get better by itself."
Contained in the plant, Ukrainian forces held their floor regardless of being minimize off from provides and surrounded by civilians, as Russian assaults leveled Mariupol round them.
To point out the world the dimensions of Russia's assault, Azov's press service operated beneath life-threatening circumstances, gathering footage and knowledge from varied positions throughout the town and later from contained in the metal plant itself, Dubyna remembers.
"I spent a few month working within the press unit earlier than being reassigned to one of many positions at Azovstal. It was speculated to be an remark submit, however by then, there weren't sufficient folks, too many have been wounded or killed, in order that they needed to pull officers from headquarters," Dubyna says.
"Our process was to watch enemy actions and, if vital, take up positions and maintain the road," he provides. "And through one in all these actions, I used to be wounded."
Dubyna says medical doctors have been shocked he survived such a extreme damage. He defined that the bullet handed via his neck, detaching arteries and veins from the muscle tissues with out rupturing the arteries themselves, which prevented speedy blood loss.
"At that time, (medics) didn't even have the means to transfuse blood to those that had misplaced it or present any important medical help," he remembers. "I had misplaced a number of blood, however there was no solution to give me a transfusion or fluids, so my physique needed to get better by itself."
About 10 days after his damage, Dubyna returned to his duties as a press officer.
"I even began writing some texts; it was robust to kind sentences and string phrases collectively, however I attempted to assist nonetheless I may," he says.
Because the battle escalated and Russian troops superior deeper into the Azovstal plant, the defenders have been ordered to give up to avoid wasting their lives.
"Beneath the circumstances we have been held in, many individuals misplaced their lives because of extreme beatings and diseases in captivity."
"When Redis (Colonel Denys Prokopenko, Azov commander) gathered us and advised us there was an order from the commander-in-chief to protect lives, we accepted it calmly as a result of we understood it was a direct order, and we needed to carry it out," Dubyna says.
"However earlier than that, nobody noticed give up as an choice. Everybody was ready for the final battle," he says, including that some troopers even requested their comrades to kill them in the event that they have been severely wounded, simply to keep away from seize.
Dubyna says he was skeptical from the beginning about Russia's promise to launch them after just some months in captivity.
"Figuring out the type of enemy we have been going through… I by no means believed it will be a fast launch," he says.
"Sadly, beneath the circumstances we have been held in, many individuals misplaced their lives because of extreme beatings and diseases in captivity."
It was, primarily, a ticket from one hell to a different.
The Kyiv IndependentIrynka Hromotska
Routine torture
The evacuation from Azovstal ended on Could 20, 2022, with Ukrainian troopers transferred to a penal colony in Russian-occupied Olenivka, Donetsk Oblast, now notorious as the positioning of the mass killing of Azov fighters.
On July 28, an explosion killed 54 Ukrainian prisoners of battle and injured over 150 on the Olenivka penal colony. Dubyna, who witnessed the occasion, says he’s sure Russian forces have been accountable, regardless of their makes an attempt responsible Ukraine for the assault.
He says {that a} day earlier than the assault, Russian guards gathered about 200 Azov fighters in one of many barracks.
"At first, we thought this was the beginning of a prisoner alternate," Dubyna remembers.
"They might threaten to chop off ears or a nostril, urgent a knife to the ear and beginning to minimize it barely, inflicting bleeding, all meant to terrify and break the prisoners."
Then, at night time, a strong blast occurred. Dubyna says the jail's authorities prevented any help from reaching the injured.
"Solely these inside that barrack tried to assist one another with no matter that they had, which was nothing. They tore their garments to make bandages and did their greatest to avoid wasting each other, pulling folks out of the burning constructing."
These Ukrainian POWs who survived the blast in Olenivka have been later transferred to the detention middle in Russia's Taganrog, notorious for the usage of torture in opposition to prisoners. It began as quickly because the POWs arrived there.
"They only began throwing us onto the ground from vehicles like we have been sacks," Dubyna says.
"And instantly, as quickly as you hit the ground, they began beating you, kicking, hitting with batons, utilizing stun weapons."
"It went on for a number of hours, whereas they have been taking us via what they referred to as 'consumption.'"
He spent 9 months there earlier than being transferred to a different facility within the metropolis of Kamyshin, in Volgograd Oblast, enduring repeated interrogations accompanied by beatings and threats of loss of life or rape, with nearly no nutritious meals or medical care supplied.
"They might threaten to chop off ears or a nostril, urgent a knife to the ear and beginning to minimize it barely, inflicting bleeding, all meant to terrify and break the prisoners."
Based on the United Nations, greater than 95% of Ukrainian POWs have been subjected to torture in Russian captivity.
Electrical shock torture was routine in Kamyshin, he says.
"After they used it, it felt like all of your bones have been breaking, like your muscle tissues have been torn aside. The ache was so intense, you'd find yourself smashing your head in opposition to the ground simply to make it extra bearable," Dubyna says.
"They'd lay you down, hook the electrodes, and run electrical energy via you. It's the type of expertise you always remember."
Based on the United Nations, greater than 95% of Ukrainian POWs have been subjected to torture in Russian captivity. Former detainees recount being brutally overwhelmed, electrocuted, suffocated, and threatened with executions. Many come again with severe accidents, fractures, misplaced tooth, and indicators of post-traumatic stress dysfunction.
With no connection to the surface world, Dubyna endured the horrors of Russian captivity by holding on to ideas about his household and his girlfriend, Olha, whom he had dreamed of marrying.
The long-awaited dream got here true a month after Dubyna was launched from captivity in September 2024.
"Once you notice that you’re again on free land, you're dwelling… it was an indescribable feeling," he says.
"It's pleasure. It's the sensation of freedom, of lightness. You all of the sudden notice you now not need to stroll hunched over, you could stand tall once more, you could look somebody within the eyes once you converse, one thing that was unthinkable in captivity."
After returning to Ukraine, POWs obtain medical care and are entitled to a go away – its period relies on the state of their well being – earlier than returning to service. As Dubyna’s go away is sort of over, he’s on the brink of rejoin his Azov Brigade in its ongoing combat in opposition to Russian aggression and to assist deliver again Azovstal defenders from captivity.
"I'm returning to service, again to Azov, to proceed combating for the return of our comrades."
Observe from the creator:
Hello! Daria Shulzhenko right here. I wrote this piece for you. Because the first day of Russia's all-out battle, I’ve been working nearly continuous to inform the tales of these affected by Russia’s brutal aggression. By telling all these painful tales, we’re serving to to maintain the world knowledgeable in regards to the actuality of Russia’s battle in opposition to Ukraine. To fund our reporting, we depend on our neighborhood of over 18,000 members from around the globe, most of whom give simply $5 a month. We’re aiming to achieve 20,000 quickly — be part of our neighborhood and assist us attain this aim.
The Kyiv IndependentDaria Shulzhenko