France commemorates 80-year anniversary of Allied landings in Provence

Liaquat Ali

Islamabad: France this week commemorated the 1944 Allied landings in Provence, an event overshadowed by the Normandy landings two months earlier, but still key to the World War II endgame in Europe.

Six African leaders joined official events as President Emmanuel Macron singled out the contribution of soldiers recruited — often forcibly — in French overseas colonies, notably in Africa.

It took decades for France to highlight the crucial role of non-white soldiers in the fighting.

Cameroon President Paul Biya told Thursday’s ceremony that their effort had been decisive.

“There would have been no Allied victory without the contribution from the other peoples, without the foreigners,” he said. “The fight was conducted together, to defend the universal values and ideas of peace and justice.”

Macron added in his speech that “when it comes to defending the nation’s vital interests all those who identify as French are called upon to come together”.

Much of the second part of the day’s events was cancelled because of storm warnings, including a reception for guests on a helicopter carrier and a re-enactment of the landings in Toulon, at the centre of fighting on August 15, 1944.

That day 100,000 American, British and Canadian troops landed on the beaches of the Var region on the French Riviera.

They were followed by 250,000 soldiers fighting for France, recruited mostly from overseas colonies in Africa, with the aim of recapturing the key ports of Marseille and Toulon from the German occupiers.

They succeeded within two weeks, having encountered only limited resistance from an exhausted German army.