Europe remembers VE Day

With quiet moments of memory or military pomp, leaders and citizens across Europe marked 70 years since the Nazi defeat and the end of a war that ravaged the continent. However, the East-West alliance that vanquished Hitler is deeply divided today.

Russia is celebrating Soviet wartime feats in a ceremony today that is causing diplomatic tensions because of the country’s role in Ukraine’s conflict. Poland has held a ceremony meant as an alternative to Moscow’s.

Paris’ mile-long Champs Elysees was closed to traffic to make way for a procession of official motorcades and mounted military escorts that ascended the boulevard from the Place de la Concorde to the Arc de Triomphe, site of the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier.