World leaders pay tribute to veterans

HEROES of the liberation of Europe were joined by a host of world leaders yesterday as tens of thousands of people paid tribute to the servicemen on the 60th anniversary of D-Day.

Veterans, many taking a final opportunity to revisit the scene of the historic invasion, took part in commemorative events as they honoured those lost in the pursuit of freedom.

Others made personal pilgrimages to sites throughout Normandy to recall their memories of friends who never returned.

This afternoon, hundreds of former British soldiers, sailors and airmen proudly marched before Queen Elizabeth II as the anniversary events reached a poignant and moving climax on the seafront of Arromanches, where many had come ashore in 1944.

The weekend’s events marked the final time most of the men will return to the stretch of French coastline where they fought the bitter battle that helped free Europe from Nazi tyranny.

With thousands of local people, soldiers and visiting dignitaries looking on, Queen Elizabeth added: “Their sacrifice must never be forgotten. What for you is a haunting memory of danger and sacrifice one summer long ago is for your country and for generations of your countrymen to come, one of the proudest moments in our long national history.”

Some 156,000 Allied troops landed on the five invasion beaches on June 6, 1944, in an operation which Britain’s wartime Prime Minister Winston Churchill described as “undoubtedly the most complicated and difficult that has ever taken place”.

It marked the beginning of an 80-day campaign to liberate Normandy which involved three million troops and cost the lives of 250,000 people.

In Bayeux, British Prime Minister Tony Blair and wife Cherie joined Queen Elizabeth and French President Jacques Chirac at a joint British-French service at the Commonwealth War Graves Commission cemetery, where around 4,200 troops are buried.

In blazing midday sun over Normandy, both the Queen and Mr Blair met former soldiers, sailors and airmen who joined 12,000 people to pay tribute to the bravery of Allied troops.

With the glinting medieval spires of Bayeux cathedral as a backdrop, a bugler sounded the Last Post and the massed congregation paused for a minute’s silence, many overcome with emotion.