March 7 2022
The Government has announced new "significant" sanctions will be placed on Russia, including oligarchs, individuals and companies responsible for or associated with the invasion of Ukraine.
An Auckland man is saying goodbye to his family to risk his life fighting for Ukraine against Russia.
The 50-year-old, who did not wish to be named, will leave for Europe in three weeks but is not unfamiliar with military conflict.
For 12 years he served in the airborne artillery division of the British Army and also worked for the New Zealand Defence Force as an explosives technician.
When asked why he wanted to join the war, he said he could not sit by as a trained professional and watch innocent people lose their lives.
"I've seen the news articles and the footage of husbands and brothers putting their families onto trains and then having to go back to where they live, to a government building and being handed a bag full of magazines and a AK-47 and they're now going to try and defend their country," he said.
"These are people that have never picked up a rifle in their life.
"If I was an untrained person and someone invaded my country I'd really want someone to help, I'd really want people that had the skills to do that."
A child speaks on the phone as he says goodbye to a relative looking out the window of a train carriage at the railway station in Kramatorsk, eastern Ukraine. Photo / AP
His application to join as a foreign volunteer was granted two days ago by the Embassy of Ukraine in Singapore and he will travel as a British citizen.
His motivation is also conjured by the fact that his own Polish grandmother was sent to a concentration camp during WWII at the age of 18.
"That basically all spiralled from a very simple thing which is very reminiscent to what Putin has done here," he said.
"I don't believe what is happening there is right or fair and you've got to stand up to a bully at the end of the day."
The New Zealand permanent resident is assured by the support the Government of the United Kingdom is providing to its volunteers in Ukraine but he is concerned that he might not be able to get back here.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade (Mfat) has a "do not travel" advisory for Ukraine in place and have said consular assistance to New Zealanders in Ukraine would be very limited.
The New Zealand Government would also not be able to evacuate Kiwis from the country, it said.
"I really hope she [Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern] doesn't make it difficult for people to go and do what they feel they need to do," the ex-British army officer said.
An elderly woman sits on a bench wrapped in a blanket in a subway station turned into a shelter in Kyiv, Ukraine. Photo / AP
He moved to New Zealand in 2004 and here he leaves behind a wife and three children aged 12, 10 and 2. He will also be resigning from his assistant manager role at a retail chain.
He said his children are distraught and have begged him not to go.
"I am lucky that I have a very understanding wife that will allow me to go, as much as she doesn't want me to she understands my motivations behind it and has backed me on that," he said.
