Instincts about the strategic significance of the Ukrainian port city of Mariupol led a team of Associated Press journalists there just as Russians were about to lay siege. It proved to be a fateful decision.
For nearly three weeks last year, Mstyslav Chernov, Evgeniy Maloletka and Vasilia Stepanenko were the only journalists in Mariupol, serving as the world's eyes and ears amid the horrors of the Russian onslaught.
