Tributes paid to ninth Brit killed in Ukraine
‘Very special guy’ Jay Morais is killed fighting in Ukraine’s east
Tributes have been paid to a “very special” British military volunteer killed during fighting in Ukraine.
Jay Morais, 52, from Bristol, fought in some of the fiercest battles in the country’s eastern region - including the Donbas cities of Severodonetsk and Bakhmut.
The death of Mr Morais, a veteran of the French foreign legion who signed up to fight last year, was confirmed by Ukraine on Tuesday.
He is thought to have died in Kharkiv in February after fighting Russian troops further east, according to The Daily Telegraph.
Mr Morais is the ninth known British national to have died in Ukraine since Russia invaded the country on 24 February last year.
Lidiya Martynova, his Ukrainian fiancée, told the paper he was a “very special guy”. He met Ms Martynova, a local humanitarian volunteer, while serving in the war.
“Jay was a very special guy,” she told The Telegraph. “He was a professional soldier, but he would always say that it wasn’t important how many enemies he’d killed, but how many people he’d saved.”
Mr Morais had previously served in the French legion in Kosovo and Ivory Coast before leaving in 2007 to work as a sales manager at Three, the mobile phone network company, in the Bristol area.
He returned to visit the UK last year having spent some time fighting in Ukraine and friends said he appeared to have been burdened by the intensity of the fighting.
“The last time he came in, you could tell what the war had done to him,” Marcus Pinson, the owner of an army surplus shop that Mr Morais used to buy equipment from, said.
“At times he would sound quite upset. But he felt he had to go back for another tour of duty as he didn’t want to let his comrades down.”
Mr Morais was reportedly given a funeral with military honours in Ukraine.
He did not have children.
His death was confirmed by Ukraine’s International Legion, a multinational unit of volunteers set up by President Zelensky.
A spokesperson said that Mr Morais had been killed in “the line of duty" but did not give any further details about his death.
A Foreign Office spokesman said: "We supported the family of a British man following his death in Ukraine."
Other Britons killed in Ukraine include Andrew Bagshaw, a 48-year-old New Zealand resident and Christopher Parry, 28, born in Cornwall, who were killed attempting a humanitarian evacuation from the town of Soledar in the eastern Donetsk region in January.
A statement released through the Foreign Office said the pair had saved over 400 lives in Ukraine.
Simon Lingard, from Lancashire, died fighting for the Ukrainian side on 7 November after his military unit was attacked.
Jordan Gatley, described as “truly a hero” who previously served as a British Army rifleman based in Edinburgh, was shot dead in Sievierodonetsk, a key city in Russia’s efforts to advance in eastern Ukraine in June last year.
Scott Sibley, a British Army veteran from North Lincolnshire, was the first known Briton to be killed in the war when his death was confirmed by the Foreign Office in April last year.
Craig Mackintosh, from Norfolk, was killed in August while volunteering as a medic.
Paul Urey, 45, from Culcheth near Warrington, Cheshire, is believed to have died in July while imprisoned in the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic.
Jonathan Shenkin, 45, from Glasgow, was serving in the embattled country as a paramedic. His relatives say he died in December.
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