Crimean Tatar Umer Ibragimov has been searching for answers for five and a half years: is his son Ervin still alive. The latter was kidnapped in occupied Crimea by unknown people in the uniform of law enforcement officers.

Astamur Ardzinba dies in an automatic shootout in a remote Abkhaz village for cryptocurrency mining equipment because it is now the primary income in a region without a future.

Arek, an Armenian from the village of Karabakh, on the verge of conflict in his old age, becomes a refugee for the second time. In farewell, he hugs the house and leaves the key in the door for those who will come in his place. And Areka’s neighbor burns his home after the last dinner because he says he did not build it with his own hands for 23 years so that the Turks would live there.

My favorite article of the Constitution is the third. She says that the highest value is a person. Her life, health, safety, honor, and dignity. However, what remains of this value after two, five, ten, twenty, or even thirty years of war or its constant hanging over your and your children’s heads?

My name is Alyona Savchuk. I am a reporter working on the topics of human rights violations, ethnic and religious conflicts, migration, and religious radicalism. This is a Mud and Blood podcast about the human dimension of the long-armed conflicts in Eastern Europe and the South Caucasus. Coming soon to all podcast platforms.