The acting commander of the Azov brigade, Major Bohdan (pronounced Bogdan) Krotevych, is a hero in Ukraine. In last year’s Siege of Mariupol, he and 2,000 men – together with civilians and other units of the Ukrainian armed forces – held out for almost three months as defenders of the Azovstal Iron and Steel works. That huge network of tunnels and bunkers provided shelter to withstand daily bombardments from far more numerous Russian forces. Ironically, it was the Soviet Union that built this enormous infrastructure to withstand such aerial bombardment.
Major Krotevych – his call sign is ‘Tavr’, meaning a native of Crimea – spoke to me from the Azov Brigade HQ in Kyiv. He is surprisingly young – just 30 – and unsurprisingly tired. Dark ‘panda’ eyes betrayed his exhaustion; a thick beard attested to a routine where shaving is a luxury; camouflage fatigues and heavily tattooed arms suggested a no-nonsense military man.
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