Isolated by Ukraine’s war, Mariupol looks for a peaceful future

For the past five years, Mariupol has been a battleground. First, it was in the most literal sense.

This industrial city of 450,000 on the Azov Sea has been the scene of pitched battles between Ukrainian forces and separatist rebels, who surround it on two sides with the front lines now just about seven miles from the city limits. Until a shaky July 21 cease-fire took hold, the sound of artillery fire was often audible in downtown Mariupol, and the ongoing war is seldom far from the subject of any conversation.

But more recently, the battleground has become ideological too. More than half of voters in the Ukrainian-controlled Donetsk region, of which Mariupol is now the biggest city, cast their ballots for

Feeling beleagueredA cutoff port“There are things we can do to improve life”