In Mariupol, pictures tell the story of a city under siege
The dead were largely abandoned in the streets.
There were no funerals. No memorials. No public gatherings to mourn those killed by Russia’s relentless attacks on the port city that had become a symbol of Ukraine’s ferocious resistance. It was too dangerous.
Instead, authorities collected the bodies in a truck as best they could and buried them in narrow trenches dug into the frozen late-winter earth of Mariupol.
The mass grave trenches told the story of a city under siege.
There was the 18-month-old hit by shrapnel; the 16-year-old killed by an explosion during a soccer game; the girl no older than 6 who was rushed to a hospital with bloody pajamas decorated with cartoon unicorns.
Oleksandr Konovalov, an ambulance paramedic, performs CPR on a girl injured by the shelling in a residential area as her dad sits, left, after arriving at the city hospital of Mariupol, eastern Ukraine, Sunday, Feb. 27, 2022. The girl did not survive. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)
An apartment building explodes after a Russian army tank fires in Mariupol, Ukraine, Friday, March 11, 2022. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)
People cover from shelling inside an entryway to an apartment building in Mariupol, Ukraine, Sunday, March 13, 2022. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka
People lie on the floor of a hospital during shelling by Russian forces in Mariupol, Ukraine, Friday, March 4, 2022. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)
A woman covers herself with a blanket near a damaged fire truck after shelling in Mariupol, Ukraine, Thursday, March 10, 2022. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)
There was the woman wrapped in a bedsheet, her legs neatly bound at the ankles with a scrap of white fabric.
Workers tossed all of them into the trenches as fast as they could, moving quickly to get back to shelter before the next round of shelling.
The world would have seen none of this, would have seen next to nothing at all from Mariupol as the siege settled in, if it wasn’t for Mstyslav Chernov and Evgeniy Maloletka, the Associated Press team who raced into the city when the invasion began and stayed long after it had become one of the most dangerous places on Earth.
For more than two weeks, they were the only international media in the city, and the only journalists able to transmit video and still photos to the outside world.
They were there when that young girl with unicorn pajamas was rushed into the hospital. They were there after the maternity hospital was attacked, and for countless airstrikes that pulverized the city.
They were there when gunmen began stalking the city in search of those who could prove Russia's narrative to be false.
Moscow hated their work. The Russian embassy in London tweeted images of AP photos with the word “FAKE” over them in red text. A top Russian diplomat held up copies of photos from the maternity hospital at a U.N. Security Council meeting, insisting they were phony.
Ukrainian emergency employees and volunteers carry an injured pregnant woman from a maternity hospital that was damaged by shelling in Mariupol, Ukraine, March 9, 2022. The woman and her baby died after Russia bombed the maternity hospital where she was meant to give birth. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)
Eventually, the team were urged to leave.
“If they catch you, they will get you on camera and they will make you say that everything you filmed is a lie,” a policeman told the pair. “All your efforts and everything you have done in Mariupol will be in vain.”
It was terrible to leave. They knew that once they were gone, there would be almost no independent reporting from inside the city. But they felt they had no choice.
So they left, slipping away on a day when thousands of civilians were fleeing the city, passing roadblock after Russian roadblock.
Their work, and the people who they met, speak for the agony of Mariupol.
Like the doctor who tried to save the life of the pajama-clad little girl. As he pumped oxygen into her, he looked straight into the AP camera. “Show this to Putin,” he stormed with expletive-laced fury. “The eyes of this child and crying doctors.”
Medics perform CPR on a girl at the city hospital of Mariupol, who was injured during shelling in a residential area in eastern Ukraine, Sunday, Feb. 27, 2022. The girl did not survive. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)
Medical workers try to save the life of Marina Yatsko's 18 month-old son Kirill, who was fatally wounded by shelling, at a hospital in Mariupol, Ukraine, Friday, March 4, 2022. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)
Medical workers move a patient in a basement of a maternity hospital converted into a medical ward and used as a bomb shelter in Mariupol, Ukraine, Tuesday, March 1, 2022. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)
Marina Yatsko, left, runs behind her boyfriend Fedor carrying her 18 month-old son Kirill who was fatally wounded in shelling, as they arrive at a hospital in Mariupol, Ukraine, Friday, March 4, 2022. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)
The children of medical workers warm themselves in a blanket as they wait for their relatives in a hospital in Mariupol, Ukraine, Friday, March 4, 2022. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)
Serhiy Kralya, 41, looks at the camera after surgery at a hospital in Mariupol, eastern Ukraine on Friday, March 11, 2022. Kralya was injured during shelling by Russian forces. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)
Russian's army tanks move through a street on the outskirts of Mariupol, Ukraine, Friday, March 11, 2022. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)
Ukrainian soldiers and emergency employees work outside a damaged maternity hospital in Mariupol, Ukraine, Wednesday, March 9, 2022. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)
Ukrainian emergency employees work at a maternity hospital damaged by shelling in Mariupol, Ukraine, Wednesday, March 9, 2022. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)
A Ukrainian serviceman takes a photograph of a damaged church after shelling in a residential district in Mariupol, Ukraine, March 10, 2022. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)
A view from a hospital window shattered by shelling in Mariupol, Ukraine, Thursday, March 3, 2022. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)
A nurse shows a newborn baby to a woman who gave birth at a maternity hospital in Mariupol, Ukraine, Tuesday, March 1, 2022. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)
Premature babies who were left behind by their parents lie in a bed in the No. 3 hospital in Mariupol, Ukraine, Tuesday, March 15, 2022. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)
Dead bodies are prepared before being put into body bags and buried in a mass grave on the outskirts of Mariupol, Ukraine, Wednesday, March 9, 2022. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)
A local worker shows bodies of children killed by shelling at the No. 3 hospital in Mariupol, Ukraine, Tuesday, March 15, 2022. (AP Photo/Mstyslav Chernov)
Medical workers treat a man, wounded by shelling, in a hospital in Mariupol, Ukraine, Friday, March 4, 2022. (AP Photo/Mstyslav Chernov)
Dead bodies are put into a mass grave on the outskirts of Mariupol, Ukraine, Wednesday, March 9, 2022 as people cannot bury their dead because of the heavy shelling by Russian forces. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)
A body lies covered by a tarp in the street in Mariupol, Ukraine, Monday, March 7, 2022. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)
A woman walks past a burning apartment building after shelling in Mariupol, Ukraine, Sunday, March 13, 2022. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)
Mariana Vishegirskaya stands outside a maternity hospital that was damaged by shelling in Mariupol, Ukraine, Wednesday, March 9, 2022. (AP Photo/Mstyslav Chernov)
People help an elderly woman as they walk in front of an apartment building hit by shelling in Mariupol, Ukraine, Monday, March 7, 2022. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)
A Ukrainian serviceman guards his position in Mariupol, Ukraine, Saturday, March 12, 2022. (AP Photo/Mstyslav Chernov)
Ambulance paramedics treat an elderly woman wounded by shelling before transferring her to a maternity hospital converted into a medical ward in Mariupol, Ukraine, Wednesday, March 2, 2022. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)
Teenager Artyom, 15, wounded by shelling, lies in a car waiting to be moved to a maternity hospital converted into a medical ward in Mariupol, Ukraine, Wednesday, March 2, 2022. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)
Women and children sit on the floor of a corridor in a hospital in Mariupol, eastern Ukraine, Friday, March 11, 2022. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)
People settle in a bomb shelter in Mariupol, Ukraine, Sunday, March 6, 2022. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka) People queue to receive hot food in an improvised bomb shelter in Mariupol, Ukraine, Monday, March 7, 2022. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)
People queue to receive hot food in an improvised bomb shelter in Mariupol, Ukraine, Monday, March 7, 2022. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)
People prepare for the night in the improvised bomb shelter in a sports center, which can accommodate up to 2000 people, in Mariupol, Ukraine, late Sunday, Feb. 27, 2022. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)
A man plays with a baby in a bomb shelter in Mariupol, Ukraine, Sunday, March 6, 2022. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)
People prepare for the night in the improvised bomb shelter in a sports center, in Mariupol, Ukraine, late Sunday, Feb. 27, 2022. (AP Photo/Mstyslav Chernov)
People sit in a bomb shelter in in Mariupol, Ukraine, Tuesday, March 8, 2022. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)
Children play in a bomb shelter in Mariupol, Ukraine, Monday, March 7, 2022. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)
People take shelter from shelling in the basement in Mariupol, Ukraine, March 12 2022. (AP Photo/Mstyslav Chernov)
Anastasia Erashova cries as she hugs her child in a corridor of a hospital in Mariupol, eastern Ukraine on Friday, March 11, 2022. Anastasia's other child was killed during the shelling of Mariupol. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)
The body of a girl killed during shelling at a residential area lies on a medical cart at the city hospital of Mariupol, eastern Ukraine, Sunday, Feb. 27, 2022. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)
A woman screams in pain as she is treated in the hospital after being injured by shelling in Mariupol March 1, 2022. (AP Photo/Mstyslav Chernov)
Marina Yatsko and her boyfriend Fedor comfort each other after her 18-month-old son Kirill was killed by shelling in a hospital in Mariupol, Ukraine, Friday, March 4, 2022. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)
The lifeless body of 18-month-old Kirill, killed in shelling, lies on a stretcher, next to an injured man resting in a hospital in Mariupol, Ukraine, Friday, March 4, 2022. (AP Photo/Mstyslav Chernov)
Serhii, father of teenager Iliya, cries on his son's lifeless body lying on a stretcher at a maternity hospital converted into a medical ward in Mariupol, Ukraine, Wednesday, March 2, 2022. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)
A house burns after shelling in Mariupol Saturday March, 12, 2022. (AP Photo/Mstyslav Chernov)
Lead Photo Caption: Bodies are put into a mass grave on the outskirts of Mariupol, Ukraine, Wednesday, March 9, 2022 as people cannot bury their dead because of the heavy shelling by Russian forces. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)
Photos by Mstyslav Chernov and Evgeniy Maloletka