The body of Lance Corporal Ian Malone, the Dubliner and Irish Guardsman killed in Iraq, was flown to RAF Brize Norton in Oxfordshire, Britain, yesterday.
Lance Corporal Malone, who came from Ballyfermot, was one of two members of the Irish Guards killed by sniper fire in Basra on April 6th.
He and a colleague, Piper Christopher Muzvuru (20), from Gweru, Zimbabwe, were getting out of an armoured vehicle when they were shot dead.
Lance Corporal Malone, who was 28 and single, joined the Irish Guards in 1997. Piper Muzvuru, who was also single, joined in 2001. He was the regiment's first black piper.
Flown back to Britain also were the bodies of five other servicemen killed in the war, among them the youngest soldier lost in action, Fusilier Kelan Turrington, from Haslingfield near Cambridge, who at 18.
The solemn repatriation ceremony was in stark contrast with the jubilant scenes at Brize Norton on Monday, when 210 servicemen and women arrived home safely to be reunited with waiting friends and family.
The return of the seven bodies brings the number of killed servicemen repatriated to 28, leaving two of the 30 British fatalities still to be brought home.
The bodies of 11 British servicemen arrived at the base last week.
Ten British war dead were brought home the week before.
As on previous occasions, all the fallen were carried from the aircraft in Union Flag-draped coffins by members of their units. Despite the bright spring sunshine, the affair was a sombre one.
Family members and friends of the dead soldiers were present.
The Central Band of the RAF, assisted by the Band of the RAF College, accompanied the bearers out to the aircraft with a solitary drum beat. Then, with appropriate music and under the RAF Ensign fluttering at half-mast, each coffin was slowly brought out to a line of waiting funeral cars. Friends and family members wept.
The ceremony on the tarmac was attended by Defence Minister Lord Bach and the Duke of Kent, Colonel in Chief of the Royal Regiment of Fusiliers.
Lieut Gen Cedric Delves, Commander Field Army, Air Vice Marshal Nigel Maddox, Air Officer Commanding No 2 Group, and Second Sea Lord, Vice-Admiral James Burnell-Nugent, represented the three main branches of the British forces. - (PA)