Ukraine was in the spotlight Tuesday at a ceremony commemorating the Allied landings in Normandy in 1944, as British Defense Secretary Ben Wallace praised the courage of Ukrainians who prepared “for death or victory,” AFP reported.

“The men and women of Ukraine are preparing to die or win today, just as our soldiers did 79 years ago,” said Ben Wallace, who recently expressed interest in succeeding Jens Stoltenberg as NATO secretary general.

For his part, his French colleague Sébastien Lecornu talked about “the day of the return to freedom.”

Foreign ambassadors in France took turns supporting the Ukrainian cause at the microphone: “The oppression of one human group over another never wins,” said the Belgian Francois de Kerkhove d’Exerdet, and Prince Joachim of Denmark condemned “a year and a half of the terrible and unforgivable invasion of Russia,” and Poland mourned “another war in Europe”.

All the nations represented (Great Britain, USA, Poland, Netherlands, Canada, Denmark, Norway and Belgium) were allowed to fly their flags and sing their national anthems, except Germany.

German diplomat Martin Schaefer praised the fact that “the courage of the Allied soldiers also made it possible to liberate the German people” from Nazism, while saying that he was “aware” that the memory of the “crimes and injuries inflicted” on his country remained. present.

“Freedom is also the legacy of June 6 for us Germans,” Schaefer concluded, adding that “Russian aggression must collapse” as four Normandy veterans and more than 2,500 people looked on at the British memorial at Vers-sur-Mer with its white stone , facing the English Channel.