Thousands of people gathered across Australia and New Zealand on Monday to pay tribute to soldiers on Anzac Day, after the COVID-19 epidemic was canceled or public gatherings and memorials were restricted two years ago.Anzac Day originally commemorated the bloody battle on the Gallipoli peninsula in Turkey during the First World War. On April 25, 1915, thousands of soldiers from the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps (ANZAC) were in the midst of a larger Allied force stationed on the narrow coastal plain of Gallipoli, in a vicious campaign that would kill more than 130,000 people. . Today, Anzac Day honors all Australian and New Zealand soldiers from all conflicts.
Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison, who is due to hold elections next month, attended a morning service in the Northern Territory city of Darwin, where Ukrainian dignitaries fighting the Russian invasion will be honored.”On this day, as we honor those who fought for our freedom and liberty, we stand with the people of Ukraine who are doing the same thing right now,” Morrison said. Across the Tasman Sea, New Zealand Prime Minister JacindaArdern said Russia’s invasion of Ukraine showed that peace could not be taken lightly.
“In New Zealand we may feel very distant from this conflict, but we are all inseparably connected to what it stands for,” Ardern said in his Anzac Day speech in Auckland.The Ukrainian flag was flown during the Anzac Day morning service at the Auckland Museum.
Crowds gathered for morning services across Australia and New Zealand on Monday without the effects of the epidemic.”The last few years have been very difficult for COVID-19,” said veteran naval officer Ray James, at a morning service at Martin Place Cenotaph, “I’m very happy to see the crowds arriving today.”
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