Sitting at a cafe in the Ukrainian port of Odesa, a local smuggler draws on his cigarette as he explains how the war has disrupted long-established underworld ties between Russia and Ukraine. "The vast majority of Ukrainian criminals took the side of Ukraine," says 59-year-old Kirim, who spoke on condition that he be given a pseudonym. "But there are also those who continue to cooperate with Russia," he notes, speaking only once a waiter had delivered the coffees and left. The cross-border network of drugs, guns and people trafficking that developed between Ukraine and Russia from the rubble of the Soviet Union had been considered one of the world's strongest. Those links have been disrupted but persist. IMAGES AND SOUNDBITES