In memory of Mariupol residents and Mantas Kvedaravicius

Mariupol

The letter was received by the Lithuanian Minister of Foreing Affairs from Nadezhda, a resident of Mariupol. It was announced at the Europen Council, translated by Roma Kriaučiūnienė. Nadezhda managed to leave the besieged city.

The second part of the article tells about Lithuanian film director Mantas Kvedaravicius. In 2016 he made a documentary about Mariupol . When the war broke out , he could not to come back. Boath food and went on his last trip with his fiancee. As a film director he coud not fail to document and create even in a besieged city. That is what his fiancee, Hanna, is talking about...

 Before the war , Mariupol had a population of about 400000 and was an important Ukrainian port city near the Azov sea. Its surroundings are rich in iron ore. 

 The city is currently surrounded by the Russian forces , it has been agreed that at least part of the population will be released. The city lacks food, water, is constantly under fire. The city was defended by batalion Azov , naval, police forces, are not allowed to bring food there...

                       Mariupol, after shelling, March 10, 2022 @ AP photo

First part

 Mariupol. In this city, everyone is constantly waiting for death.

NADEZHDA SUKHORUKOVA

resident of Mariupol

I go outside in between bombings. I need to walk the dog. It constantly whines, trembles, and hides behind my legs.

I want to sleep all the time. My yard, surrounded by high-rise buildings, is quiet and dead. I'm no longer afraid to look around.

Opposite, the entrance to the one hundred and fifth house is burning down. The flames have devoured five floors and are slowly chewing on the sixth. In the room, the fire is burning gently, as in a fireplace.

Black charred windows stand without glass. From them, like tongues, curtains gnawed by flames are falling out. I am looking at it calmly feeling doomed to die.

I'm sure I'll die soon. It's a matter of days.

In this city, everyone is constantly waiting for death. I just wish it wasn't too scary.

Three days ago, a friend of my older nephew came to us and said that there was a direct hit on the Fire station. The rescuers died. One woman had her arm, leg, and head torn off.

I wish that my body parts remain in place, even after the explosion of an air bomb.

I don't know why, but it seems important to me. Although, on the other hand, they will still not be buried during the bombing going on. This is how the police answered us when we caught them on the street and asked what to do with our friend’s dead grandmother. They advised us to put her on the balcony.

I wonder how many more balconies there are with dead bodies laid down?

Our house on Mir (Peace) Avenue is the only one that has escaped direct hits. It has nearly escaped twice when hit by shells, windows flew out in some apartments, but it was hardly damaged, compared to other houses, and it looks lucky.

The entire yard is covered in layers of ash, fragments of glass, plastic, and metal.

I am trying not to look at the huge iron structure that has landed on the children’s playground. I think it's a rocket, or maybe a mine. I don't care, it's just annoying. In the window of the third floor, I see someone's face and I flinch in fright. It turns out that I'm afraid of living people.

My dog starts howling and I understand that now they will shoot again

I am standing in the daytime on the street, and there is complete cemetery-like silence around me. There are no cars, no voices, no children, no grandmothers on benches. Even the wind died.

However, there are still a few people here. They are lying near the side of the house and in the parking lot, covered with outerwear. I don't want to look at them. I'm afraid I'll see someone I know.

All life in my city has been smoldering in basements. It reminds me of a flickering candle in our basement compartment. It is so easy to put it out. Any vibration or a gentle breeze and darkness will come.

I am trying to cry, but I can't. I feel sorry for myself, my family, my husband, my neighbors, my friends.

I go back to the basement and listen to the vile iron rattle there. Two weeks have passed, and I no longer believe that there was once another life here.

In Mariupol, people continue to sit in the basements. Every day it is getting harder for them to survive. They have no water, no food, no light, they cannot even go outside because of the constant shelling.

Mariupol residents must live. Help them. Tell everyone about it. Let everyone know that civilians continue to be killed.

Mantas Kvedaravicius@BNS

Second part

Hanna Bilobrova. The last week Mantas Kvedaravicius in the hell of Mariupol

Mach 20 : Mariupol

We spent 24 hours there and then Mantas asked the head of the house of prayer if he could film here with the camera. Did not rush to do it right now, bit by bit. And he alowed it. That elder was just happy to be shown to the world what was going on here. And Mantas started filming - their prayers, the ruined buildings. For the day before we arrived , the shell hit the house of prayer itself. Until then, people could still live in the church for a while, but later everyone had to move to the basement . Filming was possibile for a very shot time. Curfew ended at 6 p.m. morning. So we got up at about 5 p.m. and then were was a time  about 6:45 p.m. sometimes until 7 p.m. while relatively quiet . Those 45 minutes was the time when it was still possible to go outside. Sure we were scared, but shells did not fall on our heads at the time. We were able to get out of the basement a little. Mantas began filming the residents.

When we arrived, in front on the church was a house with a man`s body lying on the roof . He was thrown by an explosion wave and stuck in that roof. And there was nobody to remove him. No one could either remove the body or feed the dead`s man tethered dog, as this would have requied leaving the yard, it was very dangerous. 

I asked Mantas to film it. But he refused. His words to me were , "Anna , I did not came here to film the war, not the corpses, I do not care it. I wonder how people live in Mariupol. " And he was so childishly  happy : "there is no more life in the cinema where we stopped. People are there, but there is no life. And where we are now , people live. "

March 25-27

We decided to leave early the next day. And as soon as we discussed it , the same Russian soldiers come and pick up our car. And I go out, I still tried persuade them to leave the car , because here are the children, the old people... And they told me to "leave then the war will be over". Then they sat in the car and drove off. Just before that , one of the soldiers was told to write something on the side like "Volunteers". 

Mantas and I started thinking again how to behave and what to do. We moved our backpacks and were to go out on foot. And what is very strainge, Mantas then said  pack the food to last for five days. And it was for those days that I was looking for him, in the streets of Mariupol. I did not eat that food than was looking for him. But it was exactly the same amont days...

But then the man who accompanied us to Mariupol came unexpectedly. He was surprised that we were still here and offered to go with him . We took that girl with his dad , the man whose neighbor was stuck on the roof. Before that, we left stocks for the rest of the people. We asked for the medicine to be taken to the hospital , so that everything would not be left in the church alone. The shooting started again , we waited for it to end, so we could move. And just at that moment, a shell hits the church and explodes. We hear a fire has started . We go to the top to put everything out.   During that time the drive broke down and says. "Go to hell everyone, lets go out here and now..."

For the night we stayed in a sligthly quieter area for Mariupol . But it probably killed us. It was a place where you can hear explodes somewhere , but it was possible to stand still in the yard, smoke, go out to the next street...

Before where we were , it was a small and closed world. And here you can go to the neighboring street. And as soon as we arrived we immediatly felt relief . Mantas was well aware that you could not relax in such places and you have to be carefull until the end. And we relaxed - it looks like evething is allright, we will spend the nigth and leave tomorrow morning. We had already left Mariupol inside . This part, although close to the battlefield , was relatively quiet, because everything was already occupied there and no one was shooting yet.

March 28

The next morning I heard the gate of the yard banging. I run away and see our driver standing at the entrance with people, but Mantas is not there. I still look around , and he says - Mantas has not returned . I asked ,"How did not come back?"

And the driver was all nervous : "We were walking, Mantas wanted to take picture of a building ..." He was talking very loosely, but I understood that Mantas wanted to take picture of a building. And there, it turns out, it was some sort of military point. And they both were detained and checked. And Mantas had Lithuanian passport. 

They were undressed halfway to check the tattoos and bruises. And since we were walking with backpacks, they were heavy, according to the driver. And they found some kind of bruise on his shoulder. He was then accused of beeing a Nato  soldier, a Lithuanian sniper who had come to kill them.  

They are taken captive and kept in a building where shooting takes place all the time. In the morning, the driver was released.

March 30

And one day I go and see the same Niva swirling around the corner, and I run to ask if they found out anything . That commander looks at me without blinking and says, "Your husband is dead" I ask " How understand he is died ?"

He then replies, "A civilian in blue jacket was seen killed and lying on the street . I do not know if he was released or not and what for he was walking there". 

Then I asked to see the body and recognize him. He than said he would not help me today, because there were fighting is going on , and that I would come tomorrow.

April 1 

We came back to that place and are thinking of different options. And in the meantime, that Niva comes. I see there is no commander, but they tell me, "Sit down, lets go to the commander." And as I drive , through the front seats, I see Mantas lying on the street in front of me with a blue jacket. I start beating the soldiers sitting in front to stop , and they turn around the corner and stop. I see that commander sitting there and saying with a cold look , "What ? Yours ?" I turn arround    and run towards Mantas . The soldier tries to stop me, I run away and keep runing. It is Mantas, even though he is lying face down and his head is covered with something .  

to be continued....

Mantas Kvedaravicius film Mariupolis

xxx

after a year

I could not finish the article at all, it hurt a lot. I could feel the pain of many Ukrainians...Still, there is something to write.

As I already mentioned Mantas fiancee managed to find him and bring him to Lithuania. He was beautifully buried in his nativ Biržai. Hanna Bilobrova managed bring home his footage as well too. On its basis, the matirial was combined and documentary film was Mariupolis 2 was born. it was nominated for the best Europian documentary film in Iceland.

As the film producer and journalist Irina Prudnikova has sad at the films presentation :

"The Russians are currently trying to destroy all traces of their crimes in Mariupol. They are demolishing the houses destroyed by Russian aerial bombs... They are filing the basements with concrete, where thousands of bodies of dead Mariupol residents are still lying...

the film Mariupolis 2 is direct proof of Russian war crimes against humanity. Unfortunetly, the cost of Mantas life...

However, they have managed to kill Mantas, they will not be able to destroy the documentary evidence confirming their paticipation in the destruction of the city . 

This film must become evidence againts  Putin in the Hague or another tribunal. 

And if we were able to ask Mantas now, is his death worth this ?...

I am 100 percent sure, that he would answer "Yes"- Prudkova had no doubts. 

                                            Mariupolis 2

" You know that was absolutely incredible about Mariupol ? No one was afraid of death , even though they were. Death was already here and everyone wanted to die meaningthully . People helped each other even at the risk of their lives. They smoked outside and chatted even as the bomb fell. Money no longer egzisted because life became too short to tink about it. 

Every one was content with what they had , becoming a better version of themselves, there was no past, no future , condemnation, ambiquity ! It was haven in hell. Touching fragile butterfly wings. The scent of deaths true value. That is how life was there "- the presentation of the film says.

Key words : Mariupol residents, Mantas Kvedaravičius, Hanna Bilobrova, Mariupolis 2, war crime, Putin, Hague, tribunal.