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The notorious Azov Battalion which Russia claims are neo-Nazi’s is reportedly the major force in Ukraine’s Mariupol fighting against the Russian military that sees the city as a strategic prize it must capture.
The Azov Battalion formed in May 2014—shortly after Crimean’s voted to leave Ukraine and go Russian—was comprised of civilian volunteers from neo-Nazi groups who faced off against Russian separatists in places like Donbas.
They were known to engage in “xenophobic and neo-Nazi ideals and physically assaulted migrants, the Roma community, and people opposing their views,” Al Jazeera reported.
The battalion managed to retake Mariupol from these separatists a short time later and joined the National Guard of Ukraine.
Russia carried out some of its most brutal attacks on Kyiv, Kharkiv, and Mariupol since the war broke out, DW.com, a German news agency which is banned in Russia, reported.
Russian forces on Monday vowed to end its assault on the city and allow fighters there a safe passage out if they surrendered, which was rejected by Ukrainian officials, The Associated Press reported.
Irina Vereshchuk, the Ukrainian deputy prime minister, said there can be “no talk of any surrender, laying down of arms.”
“We have already informed the Russian side about this,” she said.
The Study of War, a Washington-based Institute, told the AP that the “block-by-block fighting in Mariupol itself is costing the Russian military time, initiative, and combat power.” The city has no electricity and little water supplies.
Avoid the Facts
Despite the major media and western politicians long denying there are Nazi brigades fighting the Russians in Ukraine, the AP report said that the Azov Battalion was one of the reasons that Russian President Vladimir Putin said he invaded the country. He said he wanted to “demilitarize and de-Nazify Ukraine.”
Putin’s critics say the Kremlin is loose with the Nazi designation and uses it to win support from the public against adversaries.
The group’s emblem is the Nazi Wolfsangel symbol but the Azovs deny that it follows Nazi ideology.
The DW report said the U.S. Congress considered designating the group a terrorist organization but that did not materialize. There was a video that emerged online last month that purported to show Azov troops dousing bullets with pig fat, which was seen as a message to Muslim Chechens fighting for Russia.
Al Jazeera reported that in 2015, about 20 percent of the recruits for the regiment identified as Nazis.
TRENDPOST: Glenn Greenwald, the journalist, took to Twitter on Friday to point out that The New York Times identified the Azov Battalion as “openly neo-Nazi” in 2015, but last week referred to the group as “far-right.”
“All you have to do to lose your status as a “Nazi” is fight on the side of the US,” he posted.
Greenwald, who rose to prominence for his report on whistleblower Edward Snowden, said all countries have neo-Nazi groups, but “none in Europe has anything close to what Ukraine has: a state-supported explicit neo-Nazi battalion, now more armed than ever. It doesn’t preclude support for Ukraine. But it should preclude arming Azov or turning their adherents into heroes.”
Unconfirmed video emerged on social media that showed residents in Ukraine claim that these Azov fighters refused to let citizens flee various cities and were behind the vast majority of the damage done on civilian infrastructure.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky also raised fresh concerns after he announced that he would ban 11 political parties and other opposition groups, but did not include open neo-Nazi militia groups.