His mother, Linda Urey, said she was “absolutely devastated” and described the separatists as “murderers”.
Posting on Facebook, she said: “I’m really angry. I told you he was very ill, I said [you] he was diabetic, I begged Sky News to give me my son back. Why did you let him die? I want answers. Why didn’t you release him?
“I hate you all. I’m totally outraged, I really am. I’m angry, very very very very angry. Murderers, that’s what you are.”
On April 29, the non-profit network Presidium said Urey had been detained at a checkpoint in southern Ukraine with a Briton, Dylan Healy.
The two men were later accused of “collusion” by separatists in the rebel-controlled DNR.
Daria Morozova, a DNR inmate rights mediator, wrote on Telegram on Friday that Urey died on July 10 as a result of “illness and stress.”
“Already during the first medical examination, Paul Urey was diagnosed with a number of chronic diseases, including insulin-dependent diabetes, damage to the respiratory system, kidneys and a number of diseases of the cardiovascular system,” added Morozova.
“For our part, despite the seriousness of the alleged crime, Paul Urey was given appropriate medical attention.”
Linda Urey previously told the media that her son was diabetic and needed insulin.
Morozova further claimed that the British Foreign Office had provided “no reaction” to Urey’s arrest despite being informed of his condition. It claimed Urey was a “professional fighter” who had taken part in conflicts in Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya, leading “military operations”.
Dominic Byrne, the co-founder and chief operating officer of the Presidium Network, said at the time of Urey’s arrest that he was working independently in Ukraine as a humanitarian aid volunteer.
In early May, Urey appeared on Russian state television in handcuffs. In the video, which his mother said was made under duress, he criticized the UK government and criticized the British media’s coverage of the war.
Urey’s sisters previously told Sky News: ‘We are coping for now. We really don’t know anything, like if he’ll be okay there, if he’s coming home, or if he’s going back to Ukraine as a prisoner exchange.
“We just don’t know, so we’re preparing for the worst.”
Urey is the first known foreigner to die in pro-Russian separatist custody since the start of the war.
Last month, two Britons and a Moroccan national captured while fighting in the Ukrainian army were sentenced to death by a court in Donetsk in what officials described as a “disgusting Soviet-era show trial”.
