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This is an archive article published on June 7, 2004

D-Day: Bush skips Iraq

World leaders honoured on Sunday the thousands of allied troops who fought and died in the D-Day landings in Normandy and vowed to safeguard...

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World leaders honoured on Sunday the thousands of allied troops who fought and died in the D-Day landings in Normandy and vowed to safeguard the transatlantic alliance forged 60 years ago.

US President George W. Bush and French President Jacques Chirac, putting aside differences over the Iraq war, said that modern leaders had a duty to honour what the soldiers died for by standing together in the cause of freedom and democracy. They were addressing a ceremony at the US cemetery at Colleville-sur-Mer near the beach codenamed Omaha where US troops landed and suffered heavy losses on June 6, 1944. Neither made any reference to Iraq. French officials had feared Bush would draw parallels between the Iraq war and D-Day.

About 20 heads of state and government and thousands of WW II veterans took part in the ceremonies amid one of the biggest security operations staged on French soil.

Some 30,000 soldiers were deployed in the area around the Normandy beaches and helicopters patrolled overhead. Among the guests was Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder, the first German leader to attend D-Day events in France, and President Vladimir Putin, the first Russian head of state to attend. Britain8217;s Queen Elizabeth, British PM Tony Blair, Canadian PM Paul Martin and Australian PM John Howard also attended.

Some 23,400 British and US paratroopers were dropped inland on D-Day and more than 1,32,000 troops were then landed on Normandy. Total Allied casualties on D-Day are estimated at 10,000, of whom 2,500 were killed.

8212;Reuters

 

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