Western leaders gathered on the beaches of northern France on Thursday to mark the 80th anniversary of the D-Day landings that marked the start of the successful campaign to free Western Europe from the oppression of Nazi Germany.
French President Emmanuel Macron, US President Joe Biden, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Britain's King Charles III were among the leaders who paid tribute to the Allied troops who served on June 6, 1944.
"They left everything behind and took all risks for our independence, for our freedom. We will not forget that," Macron said at the Normandy American Cemetery in Colleville-sur-Mer, in the presence of Biden and around 170 US veterans, many of them wheelchair-bound and some more than 100 years old.
Macron honoured 11 US veterans as knights of the Legion of Honour. Where possible, the men stood up to receive the high honour. "You came here, so you are forever at home on French soil, and we do not forget," Macron said.
Earlier, at a ceremony at the British military cemetery in Ver-sur-Mer, Macron had also presented the high honour to British veteran Christian Lamb, who was instrumental in planning the landing operation on the northern French coast during World War II.
More than 150,000 soldiers set off for Normandy from Portsmouth in Britain 80 years ago. The Allied forces on D-Day consisted mainly of troops from the United States, Britain, Canada, Poland and France.
On the evening of D-Day, the Allies recorded the deaths of around 4,400 troops. Up to 70,000 Allied troops were killed by the time Paris was liberated in August 1944.
Up to 20,000 civilians died in war-devastated Normandy.
Few of the soldiers who survived D-Day are still alive 80 years later. At the next major D-Day commemoration in five years' time, many of them will no longer be alive either, making their presence on Thursday all the more poignant.
In his speech at the American Cemetery, where 9,388 soldiers' graves are marked with white crosses and Stars of David, Biden drew parallels with the threat posed by Russia.
"We know the dark forces that these heroes fought against 80 years ago - they never fade," Biden said.
"Aggression and greed, the desire to dominate and control, to change borders by force - these are perennial. The struggle between dictatorship and freedom is unending."
He said Ukraine was "invaded by a tyrant" and that the United States and NATO will continue to stand by its side.
"We will not walk away, because if we do, Ukraine will be subjugated and it will not end there. Their neighbours will be threatened and Europe will also."
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky was present at the D-Day anniversary events on Thursday and is expected to meet Biden and Macron on Friday.
At the major international commemorative event at Saint-Laurent-sur-Mer - known as Omaha Beach - world leaders, including German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, remembered D-Day and paid tribute to the fighters of that time.
No representatives from Russia were invited.
In one of the day's most moving moments, a veteran was introduced to Zelensky on a stage that had been erected on Omaha Beach.
"You're the saviour of the people!" the man shouted at Zelensky. "You're my hero!"
Zelensky, kneeling down to the veteran being pushed in a wheelchair, replied: "No, no. You saved Europe." As the audience cheered, Zelensky continued: "You are our hero."
The man then asked for picture with Zelensky, to the delight of the applauding crowd.
Earlier, Britain's King Charles III reflected on the "heroism and determination" shown 80 years ago.
Addressing a crowd of British veterans at an event in Ver-sur-Mer, he said: "How fortunate we were, and the entire free world, that a generation of men and women in the United Kingdom and other Allied nations did not flinch when the moment came to face that test."
