By Yurii Kovalenko
KYIV (Reuters) – Tearful mourners in Kyiv on Sunday commemorated a British volunteer killed while attempting a rescue mission from the eastern Ukrainian town of Soledar.
British voluntary aid worker Andrew Bagshaw, for whom the service was held, and fellow volunteer Chris Parry, were killed during an attempted humanitarian evacuation in eastern Ukraine, Parry’s family has said.
Several dozen mourners, including fellow volunteers who knew Bagshaw and others who came to express their condolences, packed into a small church on the territory of Kyiv’s ancient St. Sophia cathedral for a service led by an Orthodox priest.
“I remember one of the first times when we went (on an evacuation run) together. He was a very quiet person, he just wanted to help people,” volunteer Ignat Ivlev-Yorke, who organised Bagshaw’s memorial service, told Reuters.
“He felt that this was his mission. That he had a duty to do it.”
Sky News reported Bagshaw’s family as saying the volunteers were killed while trying to rescue an elderly woman from the town of Soledar. Ukrainian police had said the two men were reported missing on Jan. 7.
Ukraine acknowledged for the first time on Wednesday that it had withdrawn from Soledar, almost two weeks after Russian troops said they had captured the small salt-mining town.
(Writing by Max Hunder; Editing by Alison Williams)
