Britain’s Presidium Network said two Russian soldiers captured by Britain were working as volunteers in humanitarian aid in Ukraine.
“British citizens, who were volunteers who did not belong to our organization, but we know them – Paul Urey (born 1977) and Dylan Healey (born 2000) – were arrested on Monday by the Russian army at a checkpoint,” said Dominic Byrne, one of the founders of that organization. The non-governmental organization (NGO), said the two men “went to Ukraine on their own initiative”.
According to the Presidency, the two Britons disappeared while traveling by car to help evacuate a woman and two children from Dniprorodin, in the southern region of Zaporizhia.
The last contact, the same source added, was made at 04:00 local time (02:00 in Lisbon).
The woman the two volunteers were helping was arrested after armed Russian soldiers “broke into her house”, who “forced her husband to lie on the ground” and asked her about her relationship with the two men nicknamed “British”. Byrne said.
A Briton has diabetes and needs insulin
Paul Urey’s mother admitted, in a letter from the Presidency, that she was “extremely concerned”.
“We know that my son Paul and his friend, a humanitarian aid volunteer in Ukraine, were captured by the Russians,” he said, asking for “everyone’s support to take his son home,” adding that he “is diabetic and needs insulin.”
Paul Urey was born in Manchester, Northern England, and was introduced as a family man who did not serve in the army, but spent eight years in Afghanistan as a businessman, while Dylan Healey worked for a hotel chain in the United Kingdom.
British diplomacy
The Presidency said it was in contact with the British Foreign Office, which is trying to gather information on the two men.
The complaint came a day after a ministry spokesman announced that a Briton had been killed in Ukraine and another missing.
British Foreign Secretary Liz Truss initially supported the British who wanted to go to the front in Ukraine, but this position recast the position by the UK defense secretary and military officials.
The British diplomat is currently advising its citizens not to travel to Ukraine and has warned that anyone traveling to conflict areas to engage in illegal activities will face penalties upon return to the UK.
