The captured British mercenary Aiden Eslyn. File photoMOSCOW, June 8 The family of Aiden Aslin, a British mercenary who surrendered in Mariupol and fought on the side of Ukrainian militants in Donbass, hopes for his return home and is working on his release with the British Foreign Office and the Ukrainian authorities. «We love Aiden very much and miss him very much and we hope that he will be released very soon,» the British television channel Sky News quoted the family as saying. The British Sean Pinner and Aiden Aslin surrendered in Mariupol in mid-April. Major General Igor Konashenkov, spokesman for the Russian Defense Ministry, said that «the mercenaries who arrived in Ukraine are not combatants, the best thing that awaits them is a long term in prison.» He noted that foreign mercenaries do not have the status of combatants under international humanitarian law. At the end of last week, the Prosecutor General's Office of the Donetsk People's Republic announced the end of the investigation and the transfer of the criminal case against the British mercenary Aiden Aslin to the court, he may face the death penalty. On Tuesday, British Deputy Prime Minister Dominic Raab said that the government intends to protest in connection with the criminal case against Aslin. told about the US mercenaries killed in the Donbass. At the same time, Elena Shishkina, the chairman of the committee on criminal and administrative legislation of the People's Council of the DPR, reported that foreign mercenaries who took part in the hostilities in the Donbass on the side of the Ukrainian troops were not subject to exchange.
