With a military parade and an appearance of the royal family on the balcony, the British began to celebrate the emotion on Monday 80th anniversary of the end of World War II in Europe.
The celebrations, scheduled to last four days, began to read extracts from a speech by Prime Minister Winston Churchill on May 8, 1945, and a military fanfare parade of more than 1,000 members of the British Armed Forces. Eleven Ukrainian soldiers, guests in support, paraded behind their flag, as well as fifty NATO troops.
Surrounded by active members of the royal family, King Carlos III, attended for 15 months by cancer, then praised the crowd of the Buckingham palace balcony that flees for 23 old and modern airplanes, then the acrobatic patrol of the red arrows, leaving a traicolor trace in the sky.
The king had previously helped the parade with a military uniform with particular Queen Camilla, Prince William and his wife Kate, as well as his three children, George, 11, Charlotte, 10, and Louis, 7 years old. Prime Minister Keir Starmer was also present, with about twenty veterans for many hundred years.
Thousands of people in the course of the parade
Thousands of people had gathered on the trip of Pavan Parade of British Flags.
Some had spent the night there, not to miss anything of this historic day full of emotion.
“It is a moral imperative to be here, especially in this period of war,” said AFP Patrick Beacon, 76, who came with his wife Catherine de Coventry (center). “It is so moving to be there today, 80 years of peace and serenity, I don’t know if we measure what it represents.”
“It is not so frequent that we remember the courage of an entire generation,” says Martin Rizcki, moved to listen to Churchill’s words.
In a concern of Europe, in the context of the war in Ukraine, “peace should never be considered as acquired,” King Carlos III said on April 9, before the Italian Parliament, evoking “the echoes of an era in which we expected it was relegated to the past.”
Harry’s controversial interview
The Royal Family participates in several commemorative events for Thursday, and after the controversial interview of Prince Harry Friday in the BBC, the palace said that “nothing prevents this precious victory from celebrating with enthusiasm and these brave souls (…)”.
On May 8, 1945, it was the same balcony of the Buckingham Palace as King Jorge VI and Queen Elizabeth, Winston Churchill supervisor, had praised with their daughters Elizabeth and Margaret of tens of thousands of Londoners celebrating what Churchill had called the “Victory Day in Europe” (Victoria in Europe in Europe Day).
Only two British prime ministers had the honors of the Royal balcony in Buckingham. The first is Neville Chamberlain, after Munich’s agreements with Germany, who is supposed to avoid war in 1938. And Winston Churchill, in 1945, to celebrate, with the British, the end of the war.
At night, the two princesses of 19 and 14 had allowed them to leave the palace to join an incognito in the joy, during a night that Elizabeth became queen will describe 40 years later as “one of the most memorable nights of my life.”
“We have a debt of gratitude with those ready to make the last sacrifice for our country,” said Prime Minister Keir Starmer in X.
On Monday, around fifty veterans and people of this generation would also be held at Buckingham Palace.
The British were also invited to participate in hundreds of parties, picnics, exhibitions and commemorations throughout the country.
“Probably the last chance”
On Tuesday, Queen Camilla will admire in the Tower of London an installation of about 30,000 ceramic poppies, symbols of the victims of wars and many buildings whose Westminster Palace will light up at night.
The celebrations will end on Thursday with a national minute of silence at noon (11:00 GMT), and an action service thanks to the Westminster Abbey in the presence of the royal family, before a concert in the great square of guards of horses in London.
Pubs were allowed to close two hours later as part of these celebrations.
Even if young generations are more indifferent, they are even more important since “this is probably the last time there will still be survivors” of that time, estimates the historian and specialist in the Robert Hazell monarchy, of the University College London.
Source: BFM TV
