A Manx volunteer who has spent much of his time clearing landmines in Ukraine has been jailed in his absence by a Russian court on terrorism charges.

Chris Garrett has been handed a 14-and-a-half-year prison sentence which means he will be jailed if he steps on Russian soil or is captured in Ukraine.

The Sun reports he responded to the sentence saying the verdict is ‘a pathetic attempt to smear me by those who have ­murdered, raped and tortured thousands of civilians in Ukraine.’

He was tried by a court in Donetsk which is under Russian control.

He later shared the Sun article on Twitter saying: ‘Looks like I upset someone.’

Brave Chris, 42, has spent the war blowing up artillery shells and live ammo dumped by Vladimir Putin’s retreating troops.

He was among the first into the massacred towns of Bucha and Irpin and worked round the clock in the wake of the Battle for Hostomel Airport.

Chris, known as Swampy, served in the British Army as a teen but was a tree surgeon before volunteering in Ukraine.

Chris, from Peel, became the chief explosive ordnance disposal instructor for the International Volunteer Bomb Disposal Unit.

He returned to the Isle of Man in 2023 after learning his partner Courtney Pollock, a volunteer paramedic in Ukraine from Colorado, in the United States, was pregnant.

Chris told Isle of Man Today back in April 2023: ‘It made sense to get out of an active conflict zone, move back here and try to get our lives sorted out.

‘We met in early January. I was working and got introduced to Courtney, they were looking for some help on the ground to get established in that area.

‘I just offered support in the background. Maybe a little too much support.’

After ensuring that the team he was working with was left in good hands, Chris left Ukraine and made his way back to the Isle of Man.

Having volunteered in Ukraine between 2014 and 2017, Chris returned just two days after the Russian invasion last year.

Chris worked in Bakhmut, Solodar and Chasiv Yar during his time in Ukraine.

Chris was not a soldier in the Russo-Ukrainian War but a volunteer, helping to clear land mines and explosives that were planted by Russian forces in the eastern European country.

He said: ‘It’s strange coming back. Obviously, there’s a lot of people who knew what I was doing out there and then you bump into people in the street and they said, “Oh you’re back from killing Russians then?”

‘It wasn’t my job to kill Russians and, obviously, some people don’t have a clue what I did with my time.’

Chris has since returned to Ukraine working for the charity Prevail which he co-founded to provide assistance to the war-torn country.

He has posted on Twitter charting his work training and providing talks to people in Ukraine on clearing landmines and explosives.