Silent resistance work and fear

Five Ukrainian lands are now under Russian control, and for the Ukrainians living under occupation, no future deal to end the war will not seem to change this.

Three Ukrainians in the various BBC -controlled cities they faced about the pressures they face, that they would be forced to accept a Russian passport to the dangers of carrying out small resistance work. We do not use their real names for their safety, and we will call them Mavka, Pavlo and Iryna.

The potential dangers are the same, whether in the Mariopol or Meltopol, which Russia seized in the comprehensive invasion in 2022, or in the Crimea, which was included eight years ago.

Mavka chose to stay in Melitopol when the Russians invaded its city on February 25, 2022, “because it is not fair for someone to come to my house and take it out.”

She lived there from birth, in the middle of the road between the Crimea and the regional capital, Zaborisvia.

In recent months, I have noticed intensification not only a strict policy of “Russiaificity” in the city, but by increasing militarization for all areas of life, including schools.

Pictures of advertising panels promoting recruitment to the young local population, a school notebook with a photo of Putin, and pictures and video clip of students wearing Russian military uniform instead of school clothes – boys and girls – and performing military education tasks.

About 200 km (125 miles) along the Azov Sea coast, and much closer to the Russian border, the city of Mariolpol feels as if it were “cut” than the outside world, according to Pavlu.

This main port and the center of the steel industry in Ukraine were captured after a three -month blockade and bombing in 2022.

Pavlo says Russian citizenship is now obligatory if you want to work or study or have urgent medical help.

“If a person is a person, let’s say, refuses to sing the Russian anthem in school in the morning, the FSB (the security service in Russia) will visit their parents, and it will be” full of vitality “, then anything can happen.

Pavlu survived the siege despite being shot six times, including his head.

Now that he recovered, he feels that he cannot leave because of the elderly relatives.

“Most of those who stayed in or returned to Mariolpol, did this to help their elderly parents or their sick grandparents, or because of their apartment,” told me on the phone after midnight so that no one hears.

The biggest busy in Mariolbul holds at your home, as most of the properties have been demolished in the Russian bombing, and the cost of living and unemployment increased.

“I would like to say that 95 % of the speech in the city revolves around the property: how to claim it, and how to sell it. You will hear people talk about it during the waiting list to buy some bread, on your way to the chemist, in the food market, everywhere.”

The Crimea was under occupation since Vladimir Putin included the peninsula in 2014, when the Russian war in Ukraine began.

Irina decided to stay, also to take care of one of the elderly relatives, but also because she did not want to leave her “beautiful house.”

All signs of Ukrainian identity have been banned in public places, and Erina says she cannot speak Ukrainian in public places anymore, “Because you never know who can tell the authorities to you.”

Children at the Crimea School of Crimea are required to sing the Russian anthem every morning, even the youngest. All Russian teachers, most of whom are wives of soldiers who moved from Russia.

Erina sometimes puts traditional, embroidered Vyshyvanka Top when she has video calls with friends elsewhere on the peninsula.

“It helps us to preserve our souls high, and reminds us of our happy lives before the occupation.”

But the risks are high, even to wear vyshyvanka. “They may not shoot you immediately, but you can simply disappear after that, silently,” as it declares.

Speaking of a Ukrainian friend by the police because the Russian neighbors, who came to the Crimea in 2014, told the police that he had illegal weapons. “Of course he did not. Fortunately, they allowed him to leave in the end, but it is very scary.”

Irina complains that she cannot go out alone for coffee “because the soldiers can put a weapon on you and say something bad or command you to please them.”

Resistance in the occupied cities in Ukraine is dangerous, and it often comes in small challenges aimed at reminding the population that they are not alone.

In Meltopol, Mafka talks about being part of a secret -resistant movement called a secret female Zla Mafka (Angry Mavka) “To inform people that the Ukrainians do not agree on the occupation, and we did not call for it, and we will never tolerate it.”

The network consists of women and girls in “all occupied cities largely”, according to Iryna, although it cannot detect its size or measure due to the potential risks of its members.

MAVKA describes its role in managing the social media accounts of the network, which documents life under occupation and behaves such as placing icons or Ukrainian publications in public places “to remind others that they are not alone”, or even more dangerous practices.

“Sometimes we also put a laxative in alcohol and baked goods for Russian soldiers, as a” welcoming package, “she says.

The punishment for this type of action, which the BBC cannot verify, will be severe.

Mafka says that the Russian professional authorities treat the Ukrainian language or anything related to Ukraine as an extremist.

Ukrainians are well aware of what happened to the journalist Viktoriaia Roshchyna, 27, who During the investigation of prisons allegations, he disappeared In eastern Ukraine in 2023.

The Russian authorities told her family that she died in the reservation in September 2024. She was re -body earlier this month, with many members and signs of clear torture.

Silent disappearance is the most afraid of Mafka: “When suddenly no one can discover your place or what happened to you.”

Its network has developed a set of tasks to pass the new carpenters to avoid infiltration, and so far they have been able to avoid electronic attacks.

Currently, they are waiting and watching: “We cannot take weapons and the convergence of the occupier at the present time, but we want at least to show that the population supporters of the Ukrainians here, and they will be here too.”

“It is important for us to know if Kiev is ready to fight for us. Even small steps are important.”

“We have a set of mood here. Many anxious documents may be signed, God forbid, we left under the Russian occupation for a longer period. Because we know what Russia will do here.”

Anxiety about Mavka and the people close to it is that if Kyiv agrees to a ceasefire, it may mean that Russia is following the same policy as in the Crimea, eradicating Ukrainian identity and suppressing the population.

“The locals have already been replaced by their members. But people here are still hoping, we will continue our resistance, and we will be more creative.”

Unlike Mavka, Pavlo believes that the war should end, even if it means losing his ability to return to Ukraine.

“Human life is of greater value … but there are certain conditions for the ceasefire, and not everyone may agree with them because it raises a question, why do all these people die during the past three years? Do they feel abandoned and betrayed?”

Pavlu warned against talking, even through an encrypted line, but he adds: “No person was envisaged by this decision -making process. It will not be simple, black and white.

Erina is afraid of the next generation of the Crimea who grew up in an atmosphere of violence, she says, copies their parents who returned from Russia’s war against Ukraine.

She shows her cat, which she includes, and says a child on her street, who shot her with a rubber bullet.

“For them it was fun. These children do not learn to build peace, they are taught to fight. It breaks my heart.”