Zambian student who died fighting for Russia in Ukraine buried

Zambian student who died fighting for Russia in Ukraine buried

CNN —

The Zambian student, who died fighting in Ukraine, was buried in a private ceremony in his home country on Wednesday, a family spokesman told CNN.

Lemekani Nathan Nyirenda died on the frontlines of the Ukraine War last September while fighting for the Russian mercenary group Wagner.

His family representative Dr. Ian Banda spoke to CNN on Wednesday morning as the family left for Nyirenda’s final resting place in his village.

“We’re going to bury him now… We are in a convoy… His (Nyirendas) mother and father are in a vehicle behind me. They’re crying right now,” Banda told CNN.

Nyirenda’s body was returned to Zambia last month. Upon his arrival on 11 December, his remains were transported to the mortuary of the University Teaching Hospital of Zambia for post-mortem examination in accordance with Zambian law.

“The funeral service at the Nyirenda family residence, burial and memorial formalities may not begin until the above mandatory legal procedures have been completed,” the family said in a statement at the time.

Banda told CNN that the forensic examination of Nyirenda’s body had been “confirmed” without releasing any further details.

Nyirenda is not the first African student to be killed on the Ukrainian front fighting for Russia, a development that has sparked fury across the continent.

A Tanzanian national identified as Nemes Tarimo by his country’s foreign ministry was killed last October while fighting with Wagner in exchange for money and amnesty, the ministry said in a expression on Tuesday.

Tarimo was a master’s student at Moscow Technical University studying business informatics before he was jailed for seven years on undisclosed criminal charges in March last year, the ministry said, adding that his body had been shipped from Russia and is likely to be there will arrive Tanzania soon for the funeral.

Nyirenda, 23, was funded by the Zambian government to study nuclear engineering at the Moscow Institute of Physics Engineering but was convicted of unspecified crimes in Russia in 2020 and jailed for nine years and six months, Zambia’s foreign ministry said expression announced his death in November.

In a sequel expression Last month, the ministry said Nyirenda was pardoned by the Russian government in August “to join a military operation in exchange for amnesty” and “was killed while taking part in military activities in September 2022.”

Yevgeny Prigozhin, leader of the Wagner mercenary group, admitted recruiting Nyirenda from a Russian prison and said he chose to fight for “repayment of (Africa’s) debt” to Russia and “died a hero” .