Ben Stimson, 48, and Aiden Minnis, 37, have posted videos on Russian social media this weekend standing in front of a Russian flag wearing military fatigues.
A jobless mercenary who has been disowned by his father and a former National Front member have been labelled an 'absolute disgrace' after becoming the first two British men known to be fighting for Russia in Ukraine.
Stimson, who had previously been jailed for assisting pro-Russian militia forces in the Donbass region in 2015, is currently fighting Ukrainian soldiers with the Pyatnashka brigade. Aiden Minnis is a former National Front member and convicted thug from Chippenham, whom calls himself a 'Z Patriot' Stimson posted his first picture from Donetsk onto Russian social network channel VK on March 14 and introduced his 'British friend' Aiden Minnis on the same day.
Last night, he shared footage of frontline soldiers walking past two dead bodies and land mines in a muddy field, before they dig up a hand grenade. Stimson was jailed for five years and four months for terror offences in 2017, after he went to the conflict zone in the Donbass region in 2015 for four months and assisted the anti-government militia in Ukraine, the year after Russia annexed Crimea.
However, Manchester Crown Court heard in 2017 that Stimson, formerly of Oldham, Greater Manchester, did not actually engage in any fighting during his time in eastern Ukraine and had intended to perform humanitarian work by driving ambulances. Stimson was jailed for terror offences after he went to the conflict zone in the Donbass region in 2015 for four months and assisted the anti-government militia in Ukraine, the year after Russia annexed Crimea
Stimson's father Martin, a former town councillor and Morris dancer, said he had now disowned his son, after he had supporting him during his 2017 court hearing. Stimson labels Minnis as his 'best British friend in the Russian army' and a 'good guy' in one of his posts, but the ex-National Front member is a former drug addict with a long criminal record.
The Foreign Enlistment Act 1870 makes it illegal to join the armed forces of a country fighting a state at peace with Britain, but anti-terror legislation is more likely to be invoked.Aiden Minnis is a former drug addict with a long criminal record who labelled Putin as 'still the greatest politician on earth'
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