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ISIS, Children And The Sweet Little Horrors Of War

ISIS, Children And The Sweet Little Horrors Of War
Massimo Gramellini

-OpEd-

ROME — The year begins with the absurd destiny of two children, both tiny victims of a war that we'd rather not see. On the left is a screen-grab image of a shockingly young boy who is featured in the first propoganda video of 2016 by the butchers of ISIS. Like adults members of the terror group, he wears a camouflage uniform and black headband in his curly hair. By the looks of it, he doesn't even seem old enough to go to school, but that hasn't stopped the Islamist killers from teaching him the fine art of threatening others.

In the video, he is seen stretching his cute little arm outward to indicate a position in the distance that promises death to all infidels beyond the horizon. It is meant to inspire fear, but it prompts pity instead — though not quite as much as the child inside the small coffin in the image on the right. We know only his name, Khalid, his age — two years old — and the inevitable reason he found himself plying the icy waters of the Aegean Sea in the middle of winter, on a boat destined to crash against the rocks: His young Syrian mother wanted to spare him from a childhood of war. The wooden casket helps shield our own sensitivities, because after the picture of little Aylan lying dead on a Turkish beach, we require ever more shocking images to feel outraged.

The year has started like this: one child trapped in war promising death, another dying in an attempt to flee war. There are no words or morals to this story, only the duty not to close our eyes.

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FOCUS: Russia-Ukraine War

What's Driving Chechen Fighters To The Frontlines Of Ukraine

Thousands of foreign soldiers are fighting alongside Ukraine. German daily Die Welt met a Chechen battalion to find out why they are fighting.

Photo of the Chechen Dzhokhar Dudayev Battalion in Ukraine

Chechen Dzhokhar Dudayev Battalion in Ukraine.

Alfred Hackensberger

KRAMATORSK — The house is full of soldiers. On the floor, there are wooden boxes filled with mountains of cartridges and ammunition belts for heavy machine guns. Dozens of hand grenades are lying around. Hanging on the wall are two anti-tank weapons.

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"These are from Spain," says the commanding officer, introducing himself as Maga. "Short for Make America Great Again," he adds with a laugh.

Only 29 years old, Maga is in charge of the Dudayev Chechen battalion, which has taken up quarters somewhere on the outskirts of the city of Kramatorsk in eastern Ukraine.

The commander appears calm and confident in the midst of the hustle and bustle of final preparations for the new mission in Bakhmut, only about 30 kilometers away. The Ukrainian army command has ordered the Chechen special forces unit to reinforce the town in the Donbas, which has been embattled for months.

Bakhmut, which used to have 70,000 inhabitants, is to be kept at all costs. It is already surrounded on three sides by Russian troops and can only be reached via a paved road and several tracks through the terrain. Day after day, artillery shells rain down on Ukrainian positions and the Russian infantry keeps launching new attacks.

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