Two British men have gone missing in Ukraine, the Foreign Office has said.
The families of both UK nationals were being supported after they disappeared, according to a statement released on Monday.
A Foreign Office spokesperson said: “We are supporting the families of two British men who have gone missing in Ukraine.”
The men were named in reports as volunteers Andrew Bagshaw and Christopher Parry.
The pair were last known to have been travelling from Kramatorsk to Soledar on 6 January, according to Sky News.
Parry, reportedly a running coach from Cheltenham, recently told Sky News that he had been driving to towns and villages on the frontline to evacuate local residents.
He told Sky News: “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.”
Bagshaw traveled to Ukraine from New Zealand, and had been delivering aid and evacuating citizens, according to a statement provided to the Guardian by the group Kiwi Aid and Refugee Evacuation.
In the statement, his parents Philip and Dame Susan Bagshaw, who founded the Canterbury Charity hospital, confirmed their son was missing. He is “a very intelligent, independently minded person”, who went to Ukraine as a volunteer, they said.
“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,” the statement added.
“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, Bagshaw – a genetics researcher – told the New Zealand news outlet Stuff that he had been evacuating mostly elderly people out of the eastern Ukrainian town of Soledar for about a month.
New Zealand’s foreign ministry said it is aware of reports a dual New Zealand/British national is missing in Ukraine and is in contact with the UK government.
