Ukrainian Medic’s Months in Russian Cell: Cold, Dirty and Used as a Prop
KYIV, Ukraine — During the siege of Mariupol, in southern Ukraine, Russians pounded the city with artillery and blocked civilian escape routes, creating one of the worst humanitarian crises of the war. As Ukrainian soldiers holed up in the Azovstal steel plant, the medic Yulia Paievska took on the dangerous work of evacuating families from a city under constant assault.

Ms. Paievska, 53, was already well known in Ukraine as Taira, a nickname she first used in the video game World of Warcraft. Her all-female volunteer medic group, called Taira’s Angels, had become famous in Ukraine during the earlier war in the eastern Donbas region.

So when Russian soldiers captured her on March 16 as she was evacuating a group from Mariupol, they knew exactly who she was. Held for three months, unable to communicate with her husband and daughter, she became a symbol of Ukrainian bravery and self-sacrifice.