(Washington) Lawmakers and family members said Wednesday that Americans who volunteered to fight with Ukrainian forces have been missing for several days and may have been captured by Russia.
Posted on June 15
Alexander Drewic and Andy Tai Huynh, both from Alabama, were involved in the fighting north of the Ukrainian city of Kharkiv, according to these accounts.
“Earlier this week, the mother of Alexander Drake, an Army veteran” who “voluntarily helped the Ukrainian army fight Russia, called my services after losing contact with his son” for “several days,” Alabama Representative Terry Sewell said in statement.
His colleague Robert Aderholt added that the family of Andy Tai Huynh, a former Marine, had not been in contact with him since June 8 “when he was in the Kharkiv region”.
“They are presumed prisoners of war, but (that) has not been confirmed,” Alexander Drake’s mother told CNN. Bonnie Drake added that the US embassy in Kyiv “was unable to verify his presence with the Russians, and all they can verify is that he is missing.”
“We don’t want to make assumptions about what might happen at this point,” Andy Tai Huynh’s companion told the American channel. “Obviously we are considering several scenarios, one of which is that it could have been captured,” Joy Black continued.
The two senators told AFP that they were in contact with their relatives and the US State Department.
A US diplomatic spokesperson said: “We are aware of unconfirmed information about two US citizens who have been arrested in Ukraine.” “We are closely monitoring the situation and communicating with the Ukrainian authorities,” he added.
For his part, White House spokesman John Kirby called on Americans not to go to Ukraine to fight there. “It is a war zone, there is fighting. If you want to support Ukraine, you can do it in many other ways.
