Commemoration in France: 80th anniversary of the Allied landings in Provence
At the memorial ceremony, heads of state and government from six African countries also participated. Ten weeks after D-Day, the Allied landing in Normandy, around 350,000 soldiers landed on the shores of the Mediterranean on August 15, 1944, including units from the USA, Britain, and Canada, as well as French soldiers and tens of thousands of soldiers from the then African colonies. After less than two weeks, the port cities of Marseille and Toulon were liberated from German occupation.
"Without the contribution of other peoples, there would have been no victory for the Allies," said Cameroon's President Paul Biya. "This fight was waged together to defend the universal values and ideas of peace and justice," he continued. Around 130,000 soldiers from Algeria and Morocco, as well as 12,000 soldiers of the French colonial army, were involved in the landing in Provence.
In addition to Biya, heads of state and government from Gabon, Comoros, the Central African Republic, Togo, and Morocco participated in the memorial ceremony. Relations between France and other former colonies had recently deteriorated. Algeria, Mali, and Niger did not accept the invitation from France.
"France was able to write 'Liberty, Equality, Fraternity' on its flag in part thanks to the Senegalese soldiers," said former infantryman N'Dongo Dieng of the news agency AFP. He watched the ceremony with four other former fighters from Senegal. "France had forgotten us, but they are making up for lost time," added his compatriot Oumar Diémé.
In Boulouris-sur-Mer, 464 soldiers who were killed under the French flag in August 1944 are buried. A second part of the memorial ceremony, in which paratroopers were to land on the beach near the city of Saint-Raphaël and fighter jets were to fly over the area, was cancelled due to a severe weather warning.
The French Republic played a significant role in the Allied landing in Provence, with thousands of soldiers contributing to the Operation Dragoon. During the memorial ceremony, President Macron of the French Republic expressed gratitude for the international cooperation that led to the Liberation of France.
