{"id":102339,"date":"2025-05-15T02:08:11","date_gmt":"2025-05-15T02:08:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/102339\/"},"modified":"2025-05-15T02:08:11","modified_gmt":"2025-05-15T02:08:11","slug":"family-of-australian-man-feared-dead-in-ukraine-hopeful-caleb-list-is-alive","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/102339\/","title":{"rendered":"Family of Australian man feared dead in Ukraine hopeful Caleb List is alive"},"content":{"rendered":"

Relatives of a Queensland man feared killed fighting in Ukraine are in shock and holding onto hope he is alive, an uncle says.<\/p>\n

Caleb List, 25, of Gladstone, was part of the Ukrainian foreign legion, a Ukrainian ground forces military unit of international volunteers.<\/p>\n

He joined the unit in 2022 and sources have told the ABC he is believed to have died last month during heavy fighting in the Kharkiv region.<\/p>\n

His uncle, Michael Connolly, said he was fulfilling his dream to be a soldier.<\/p>\n

“From Caleb’s point of view, he saw an injustice in the world and he thought he might be able to help,”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Mr Connolly said.<\/p>\n

“He’d always wanted to be a soldier.”<\/p>\n

He said so far, the family had not had any confirmation about his remains and whether they had been found.<\/p>\n

“When they can’t produce anything of that nature, then there’s always hope,” Mr Connolly said.<\/p>\n

“We’re all in a bit of shock and we all are waiting on news to come out of the area.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Loading…<\/p>\n

He said previously Mr List had been in regular contact with both his parents, but communication was difficult at times.<\/p>\n

“From the communication that was received, he was always happy and healthy and well.”<\/p>\n

Mr Connolly said about 16 months after he first went to Ukraine in 2022, his nephew returned to Australia to visit his family.<\/p>\n

“We were not aware that he was going to re-enlist \u2026 so it was a bit of a surprise,” he said.<\/p>\n

“We were trying to convince him to stay here and be with family and friends.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Foreign Minister Penny Wong said consular assistance was being provided to Mr List’s family.<\/p>\n

Advice remains that people should not travel to Ukraine.<\/p>\n

‘He saw an injustice’<\/p>\n

Mr Connolly described his nephew as a “gentle soul” who would help anyone in need.<\/p>\n

He said Mr List was passionate about the army and had spent a lot of his young life involved in the army cadets.<\/p>\n

“He would have lived there if he was possibly able to; his fascination with the armed forces was from a young age,” Mr Connolly said.<\/p>\n

Mr List had previously been rejected to serve in the Australian Army.<\/p>\n

“It’s really hard to speak on his behalf with regards to how and why he did it [fighting in Ukraine],” Mr Connolly said.<\/p>\n

“His desire to be a soldier was very strong and he wanted to help and make a difference.<\/p>\n

“From my observation as his uncle, I just saw a young man who lit up whenever he was doing anything with the soldiering side of life.”<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Caleb List is believed to have died last month. (Supplied: Facebook)<\/p>\n

Mr Connolly said that, as a child, Mr List was energetic, loved sports and working with his hands.<\/p>\n

“He was always fixing things on his father’s property. He was brought up in the country,” he said.<\/p>\n

Mr Connolly said Mr List spent most of his childhood and adult life in the Gladstone region.<\/p>\n

Mr List worked as a trade assistant at Queensland’s Yarwun refinery.<\/p>\n

Mr Connolly urged the public not to make a value judgement about Mr List.<\/p>\n

“He simply went over there because he saw an injustice and he thought he could make a difference,”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

he said.<\/p>\n

“We pray that he will come back home.<\/p>\n

“It’s very hard to speak about him in past tense because in my mind, he’s not \u2014 he’s not gone.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Relatives of a Queensland man feared killed fighting in Ukraine are in shock and holding onto hope he…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":102340,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7654],"tags":[47294,47295,47288,47292,2000,299,47290,47291,47296,47289,657,47293],"class_list":{"0":"post-102339","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ukraine","8":"tag-australian-army","9":"tag-australians-fighting-in-ukraine","10":"tag-caleb-list","11":"tag-central-queensland","12":"tag-eu","13":"tag-europe","14":"tag-feared-dead-in-ukraine","15":"tag-fight-in-ukraine","16":"tag-foreign-legion","17":"tag-gladstone-labourer","18":"tag-ukraine","19":"tag-ukraines-armed-forces"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/102339","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=102339"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/102339\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/102340"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=102339"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=102339"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=102339"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}