THE parents of an Army paramedic from Winchester currently serving somewhere in Iraq or Kuwait, have spoken of the pride yet concern they feel for their boy.

Twenty-six-year-old Lance Corporal Simon Harmer, pictured above, is in the Royal Army Medical Corps and was sent to Kuwait four weeks ago.

He is currently thought to be working with front-line British forces in Iraq, though news of his exact position is unavailable.

At first he was regularly able to keep in touch with his parents, Jon and Moireach Harmer from Kings Worthy. But his last letter was dated March 17 and what action he has seen since then, Jon and Moireach just don't know.

LCpl Harmer, who has been in the Army for six years and is normally stationed at Tidworth Barracks on Salisbury Plain, has been to the desert before.

The Daily Echo featured Simon in November 1999, after he had returned from Egypt on a two-month exercise supplying medical cover to about 4,000 British troops.

After leaving school in 1995, he trained to become a paramedic with the Royal Army Medical Corps at their training centre in Warwickshire before qualifying as a frontline medical technician.

However, for as long as his parents can remember, the former pupil of both the Henry Beaufort School and Peter Symonds College in Winchester, has always wanted to be in the Army.

Moireach, a nurse at the Royal County Hospital in Winchester, said: "As far as we know he was in Kuwait, but we don't know where he is now.

"It worries me to death sometimes, but there you go. . .it's the job he's always wanted to do."

Jon, who spent years working with the Army and is a former Merchant Seaman, said: "We're extremely proud of the work he's doing. We

know he'll be doing a great job to the best of his abilities.

"But, of course we're obviously concerned about how he is, and at the moment we would just like him to come home.

"No one knows how long he will be out there - I suppose the best person to ask would be Saddam Hussein!"

Moireach added: "We hope he just comes back to us as safe and as soon as possible."