Russia's War Against Ukraine
OP-ED
The Economist: Battle zone by the beach
Ukrainian servicemen of volunteer Donbas battalion patrol the sea shore in Shyrokine village, near Mariupol, Donetsk Oblast on April 15.
This was once a spot for holidaymakers, the sort of place where Ukrainian families would go to grill shashlik on warm summer weekends beside the Azov sea. Children went to camp on a hillside overlooking the shore. Now Shyrokyne is at the center of a war that never officially began and shows little prospect of ending. The crackle of machine-guns drowns out the lapping of the waves. The children's camp has become an army base, with crates of ammunition stacked in the entry. The beach is laced with mines.
