Emile-Antoine Roy-Sirois, 31, of Montreal, died along with three other foreign fighters on July 18 when his company was ambushed by a Russian tank near the front lines in Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region. It is believed to be the first Canadian death in active combat during the 2022 Russian invasion. “Emil brought humanity to the team,” says one of his teammates, known as “Finn.” “He was very kind. The team just won’t be the same without him.”
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Sirois’ body is now in a morgue in the central Ukrainian city of Dnipro, awaiting instructions from the Canadian embassy on how he should be repatriated. The Ukrainian Armed Forces, in which Sirois served, offered to pay for the repatriation costs. Sirois, a paramedic with experience in the French Foreign Legion, was killed along with Luke “Skywalker” Lucyszyn and Bryan Young, both Americans, and Edvard Selander Patrignani of Sweden. The men were part of an international battalion within the Territorial Defense of the Armed Forces of Ukraine. 2:26 Retired Canadian veteran seriously injured while fighting Ukrainian forces finally returns home Retired Canadian veteran seriously injured fighting Ukrainian forces finally returns home Global News spoke to comrades of Sirois, who was affectionately known as “Beaver”, at an informal memorial service for the four fallen soldiers at a downtown restaurant in Kyiv on Wednesday. Two of the men had been temporarily released from hospital to pay their respects – one with an IV catheter still attached to his arm. Both were injured in the July 18 attack that killed Sirois. It was a relaxed afternoon of laughter and lively discussion that belied the horror of a brutal Russian attack targeting the group as they tried to save a wounded soldier.
A foreign battalion was formed to support the Ukrainians
The foreign fighter company, made up of about 80 men and three women, was formed in late June and deployed to eastern Ukraine to slow the Russian advance, under the command of a Ukrainian commander named Ruslan. The battalion was initially deployed in Lysychansk, Sievierodonetsk region, before the city was captured by Russian forces on 2 July. They were then sent to the small village of Hryhorivka, four kilometers northeast of the strategic city of Siversk. Under Ukrainian control, Hryhorivka is surrounded on three compass points by Russian-held territory, at the top of the front line. The Russian-controlled area of Ukraine and the village of Hryhorivka, where Sirois was fighting. Global News Siversk is at the center of a current Russian push for territory and is on a highway critical for transporting goods and troops to the front line. On the day of the attack, the soldiers say they received information that Russian troops were crossing the Siverskyi Donets River on foot, from Russian-held territory, and setting up position in an attempt to capture Hryhorivka. About 30 men, divided into three groups, walked out to defend their position, soldiers say. Sirois went with them. Kim Patrik Hunsdal, from Norway, remembers that they were walking along a valley road, the village of Hryhorivka on one side and the river on the other, when they were “caught completely off guard”. “A tank rolled up on us and was watching us. The teams ahead were behind some cover… but the last team [couldn’t],” He says. Kim Patrik Hunsdal, from Norway, says the team was ambushed by a Russian tank when they were trying to defend their position. Global News. “We just took so much incoming fire – it was mortars, artillery, tanks shooting at us and all at the same time.” A Ukrainian soldier who wanted to be known only by the callsign “Fin” says the Russian artillery was accompanied by drones, which aided in the accuracy of their fire.
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Luke Lucyszyn, the American, was injured as the groups came under fire, Fin says. Lucyszyn was a medic, and as no other medic was available, Fin and Patrignani, the platoon surgeon from Sweden, rushed to provide medical assistance. “We asked Oscar (another soldier) and Emile to come and help us because they were the biggest guys in the group,” says Fin. “But once the children chose [Lucyszyn] above, there was a direct hit from a tank.” 2:05 Ukrainian troops dig in to stop Russian advance in Donbass Ukrainian troops dig in to stop Russian advance in Donbass – July 8, 2022 Lucyszyn, Patrignani, Young and Sirois were killed in the attack. Finn suffered shrapnel and concussion injuries, while Oscar also suffered shrapnel injuries. Finn says he managed to crawl to safety and sought shelter under a tree. “There was a lot of dust and we couldn’t see what happened. There was constant shelling after that,” Fin says. “They just kept going. They really wanted us dead.” Hunsdal says they expected a higher death toll because of the intensity of the bombing. The shelling was so intense for the next few hours that the bodies of the four men were not recovered until a day later. Ruslan, the company commander, escorted Sirois’ body from the front line to Shiversk, before it was accompanied by another officer to a hospital in Kramatorsk and finally to a morgue in Dnipro. Speaking at the makeshift memorial in Kyiv, Ruslan says he felt personally responsible for escorting the bodies of fallen soldiers. “I was responsible for the development of this company from the beginning. We spent a lot of time together, training and then fighting together. We are a family,” he says. Ruslan, Sirois’ Ukrainian commander, says Sirois was an “irreplaceable loss”. Braden Latham. Sirois was one of two Canadians under Ruslan’s charge. The group consisted of fighters from several countries, including the United States, New Zealand, Sweden, Norway, Georgia and Belarus. About five or six men had decided to terminate their contracts with the company after the attack, Ruslan says. He had contacted the Canadian embassy in Kyiv, which Prime Minister Justin Trudeau reopened in May but still does not offer consular services within the country, about repatriating Sirois’ body. He is still waiting to hear, through the embassy, whether the family wants the body cremated or repatriated so he can send Sirois home. In the meantime, he is waiting in a morgue in Dnipro. “There’s a lot of red tape,” says Ruslan. Global Affairs declined to answer questions about Sirois’ death. In a statement, it said it was “aware of the death of a Canadian in Ukraine” and that consular officials were in contact with the family.
“They are heroes and I love them”
On a hot Wednesday afternoon in central Kiev, soldiers sat around a large table in a traditional Crimean Tatar restaurant, joking and sharing memories of their fallen comrades as waiters in traditional Crimean garb delivered heaping plates of meat and pasta. The men were joined by his wife and sister Lucyszyn, as the American’s funeral had taken place earlier that day. Finn, who is now on crutches due to his injuries and recovering in a Kiev hospital, was given a temporary discharge to say goodbye to his friends. Dressed in military uniform, he says he would return to his hospital bed later that night.
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Sirois had joined the company in early June, Fin says, along with Lucyszyn. She remembers him as “kind, gentle and always apologetic.” “It was always a joke — we asked him, ‘When you shoot the Russians, are you going to apologize before that?’ As a Ukrainian, Finn says serving alongside foreigners fighting for his country is a “strange feeling”, but the “gratitude and respect we feel for them is huge”. “Most of these guys have nothing here to fight for other than their emotions or their morals or their understanding of right and wrong,” he says. “But all the foreigners I’ve talked to are wonderful people. You wouldn’t see that in every army – foreign people with such dedication, who come not for themselves but for others.” A Swedish soldier known as Oscar was wounded in the attack that killed Sirois and struggles with survivor’s guilt. Global News. Oscar, who was also injured with Finn in the attack, is at the makeshift memorial with an IV still attached to his arm. He says he asked to be discharged from the hospital to spend the day with his mates, but his doctor was slow to get back to him, so he left. Visibly emotional as he talks about his fallen “brothers” under a hat, Oscar says he struggles with survivor’s guilt. He sways as he talks and is largely unable to make eye contact. “There are shrapnel in my legs and back, but this is where it hurts the most,” he says, pointing to his head. “I don’t know why I survived. That’s pretty horrible.”
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Oscar says the men who died were his “best friends” and “the Russians killed them like dogs.” It was him…
