Two British men who went to Ukraine to help evacuate war victims haven’t been seen or heard from in 4 days

The two British men, Andrew Bagshaw and Christopher Parry, were volunteering to help evacuate local residents.
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Two British men who went to volunteer in Ukraine to help with the civilian evacuation and humanitarian efforts have gone missing, the Foreign Office has confirmed. According to a statement released on Monday (January 9), the pair were last seen at 8am last Friday (January 6) before their contact was lost.

According to Sky News, the volunteers, named as Andrew Bagshaw, 48 and Christopher Parry, 28 were last known to have been travelling from Kramatorsk to Soledar before their disappearance. Parry, reportedly a running coach from Cheltenham, said he had been driving to towns and villages on the frontline to evacuate local residents.

In an interview with Sky News previously, Parry said: “I take each day as it comes. Sometimes when you see some pretty terrible things it does stay with you. But you’ve got a job. You’re in a position of care and as soon as you pick these people up you’ve got to get out and get away from the artillery, which is constantly going off around us.

“When you get back and think, ‘that was kind of close, that was only 100 metres away from us’ that’s when you think maybe my luck might run out, but it’s worth it to save these people.”

Meanwhile, Bagshaw, a dual New Zealand/British national is reportedly to have travelled to Ukraine from New Zealand and had been delivering aid and evacuating citizens, reported the Guardian. In a statement released by the group Kiwi and Refugee Evacuation, his parents confirmed that their son was missing.

His parents, Philip and Dame Susan Bagshaw, who founded the Canterbury Charity Hospital in New Zealand described Bagshaw as “very intelligent, independently minded person”, who went to Ukraine as a volunteer. It is unsure which part of the UK he was from.

The statement added: “He was born in the UK, and Philip and Susan are very grateful for all the agencies, from both London and NZ, who are working so hard to find him. Andrew’s parents love him dearly and are immensely proud of all the work he has been doing delivering food and medicines and assisting elderly people move from near the battlefront of the war.”

In August, genetics researcher Bagshaw told the New Zealand news outlet Stuff that he had been evacuating mostly elderly people from the eastern Ukrainian city of Soledar for around one month. The New Zealand foreign ministry is in communication with the British government regarding reports of the missing person in Ukraine.

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