Kyiv, Ukraine
CNN
—
Russian President Vladimir Putin sat across from his defense minister in the Kremlin last April, slouched in his seat and gripping the table. They were discussing Russia’s siege of the Azovstal Iron and Steel Works plant in the strategic city of Mariupol, in southeastern Ukraine.
To Ukrainians, Azovstal had become a bleak but potent symbol of resistance, sheltering about 2,600 soldiers and civilians while the fortress-like facility was pummeled by Russian bombardment for weeks. To Moscow, the vast site was a frustration, the last stubborn holdout in a city that its forces had otherwise taken control over weeks earlier.
“Block off the industrial site, so that not even a fly can escape,” Putin spat, his command broadcast on state-run television.
But as the Russian president ordered a tightening of the noose around the hulking factory complex, a…
