Ukrainian veterans bring the treat, paid for by donations, to cheer soldiers on the frontline

There’s no knock on the door, just the tantalising smell of melted cheese, ham and tomato sauce reaching the noses of Ukrainian soldiers.

The pizza delivery man has arrived.

As the war goes on in Ukraine’s separatist east, some veterans of the conflict are risking their lives by going back to the frontline to bring pizza to those still in the trenches.

“Eat it up quickly, while it’s hot and they’re not shooting,” says the bullet-proof-vested Oleksiy Kachko, opening a box of pizza in front of a group of surprised soldiers.

“This is for us?” the soldiers ask in amazement, smiling.

“The enemies are less than 80 metres from here. I reckon they can smell our pizza and their mouths are watering,” Mr. Kachko says. Mr. Kachko, 23, previously fought in the Azov volunteer battalion and his partner in the deliveries, Bogdan Chaban, is also a 23-year-old former volunteer fighter. Now they manage a pizzeria called Pizza Veterano in Mariupol, the only major city still under Kiev rule in the eastern regions controlled by the pro-Russia separatists.

Win-win effort

Opened in May, the pizza joint employs mostly veterans. One of the first things they did was to start delivering pizza to soldiers on the frontline, which is about 20 km from Mariupol.

Mr. Kachko and Mr. Chaban opened a franchise of the successful Pizza Veterano network launched in Kiev by another former soldier several years ago. “It’s not just about earning money, it is employing veterans who find it very hard to get jobs,” Mr. Kachko says, while the pizzeria helps them with “adaptation to peaceful life”.

Every week Kachko and Chaban return to the frontline with pizzas paid for with donations made online and in the pizzeria.

For security reasons they have to agree the schedule and route of their visits with the military command.

It’s not the food that really matters, says Vadym Sukharevskiy, the battalion commander. “When a soldier is stuck under constant fire and short of sleep and he sees a guy coming over with pizza, he realises he’s not alone, that there are many people behind him, praying for him.”