Bush honours fallen soldiers
2005-05-08 13:21
Maastricht - As a chilly rain soaked thousands of white crosses marking American war dead, US President George W Bush paid homage on Sunday to the "terrible price" paid by World War II soldiers who never came home from their fight against tyranny.
"On this peaceful May morning, we commemorate a great victory for liberty," Bush said at Europe's third-largest cemetery for American veterans near here in Margraten. "We come to this ground to remember the cost for which these soldiers fought and triumphed."
Bush marked the 60th anniversary of the May 1945 signing of the Berlin armistice that ended the war in Europe in a solemn remembrance at the Netherlands American Cemetery and Memorial, where 8 301 US veterans are buried.
Before brief, 10-minute remarks Bush and Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands laid wreaths of tribute, a bugler played taps and military aircraft streaked above the graveyard's sweeping arcs of headstones. First lady Laura Bush laid flowers at the grave of a Medal of Honour winner who was in the 104th Division, in which her late father served during the war.
"Our debt of gratitude is too great to express in words," Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende said of the American liberation of the Netherlands from the Nazis. "They gave us the most precious gift - freedom. Today, I salute them."
From the ceremony, Bush flew to Moscow where he and dozens of other world leaders are continuing the V-E Day celebrations at a Red Square military parade that Russian President Vladimir Putin is staging on the day regarded there as a great historical date.
- AP