Tuesday, 25 April 2023
08:10 Andrew Little live from Gallipoli
Defence Minister Andrew Little is at Gallipoli to lead the New Zealand delegation at the Anzac Cove dawn service.
A New Zealand flag being held at a memorial service in April 2015 in front of Ataturk Memorial on Chunuk Bair near Anzac Cove in Gallipoli. Photo: AFP
08:25 Le Quesnoy to house NZ memorial museum
Le Quesnoy Commemorative Service Photo: NZ Defence Force
After the 1915 Gallipoli campaign many of New Zealand's soldiers spent the next three years fighting in the trenches of northern France and Belgium and the French town of Le Quesnoy has a special significance. In 1918 our troops liberated the town from four years of German occupation and it will soon house New Zealand's first memorial museum for Kiwi soldiers who died in Europe during World War One. An Anzac commemoration ceremony was held at Le Quesnoy on Sunday and Jude Dobson was there to film it.
08:45 Cathedral Square's first dawn service since 2010
Photo: RNZ / Nate McKinnon
Earlier this morning Christchurch's Cathedral Square saw its first dawn service since the earthquake in 2011. The city's Mayor Phil Mauger was there.
09:05 Waitangi Treaty Grounds Field of Remembrance
Photo: Waitangi treaty grounds field of remembrance
A Field of Remembrance consisting of 569 memorial crosses with the names of Māori service personnel killed in action and buried overseas has been laid and will remain in place after Anzac Day. The last surviving member of the 28 (Māori) Battalion, Tā Robert Gillies will present the 28 (Māori) Battalion Campaign and Battle Honours Memorial flag with the Battalions’ 42 Campaign and Battles Honours to the nation at Te Rau Aroha Museum of the Price of Citizenship where it will rest as a monument to the Battalions fallen Hōia who never returned home.
09:20 Whanau of WWII soldiers receive medals
It's been a busy few years for Auckland lawyer David Stone. A curious question about his great uncle has led him on a years-long mission to reunite members of the Māori Battalion with their unclaimed medals. His work is paying off though. Over the past year, seven ceremonies have been held to reunite hundreds of whānau with more than a thousand unclaimed medals.
The 28th Maori Battalion at a transit camp in Egypt on the morning after their evacuation from Crete, June 1941. Photo: DIA / Alexander Turnbull Library
09:45 NZ soldiers in Sinai
Lieutenant Colonel Kevin Williams during the handover of command, New Zealand contingent, MFO, February 2022. Photo: Supplied / NZDF
The Anzacs tasted nothing but defeat at Gallipoli but later on New Zealand soldiers were involved in victories over what was then the Ottoman Empire. One such place was the Sinai desert - which sits at the eastern edge of Egypt next to Israel. From April 1916 to January 1917 New Zealand troops took part in a series of battles in Sinai which pushed the Turks back towards Gaza. Now, New Zealand soldiers operate in the same part of the world as peacekeepers. They've been there for 40 years as part of a multinational force to monitor compliance of the peace treaty between Israel and Eygpt, after a war between the two in 1973.
10:05 Ambassador Omur Unsay on Turkey's 100th birthday
Photo: Turkey's Ambassador to New Zealand Omur Unsay
Earlier this morning Turkey's ambassador to New Zealand Omur Unsay attended the dawn service here at the National War Memorial. Her country's story of resistance as they defeated Allied forces at Gallipoli in 1915 is well known but what is perhaps less familiar is what happened to Turkey in the years that followed. After the end of the First World War in 1918 British, French, Italian and Greek forces occupied Constantinople - now called Istanbul. A Greek army invaded from the west and drove deep into the heart of mainland Turkey. Out of this chaos a Turkish nationalist movement emerged to fight a war of Independence which by 1923, they had won. And this October marks the one hundredth birthday of the Turkish Republic.
10:20 Aboriginal playwright Wesley Enoch
Sydney Festival director Wesley Enoch Photo: Darren Thomas
This Anzac Day could have a special poignancy for indigenous Australians. Thousands of them served in the First World War and other conflicts hoping it would help usher in greater equality at home. Those hopes have never been fully realised but later this year Australia will vote in a referendum on whether to amend the country's constitution to enshrine a voice for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders. Wesley Enoch is an acclaimed aboriginal playwright and theatre director and he's a strong supporter of the referendum.
10:45 Prime Minister Chris Hipkins' Anzac message
Prime Minister Chris Hipkins will today attend the Anzac Day National Commemoration Service at the National War Memorial in Wellington.
Photo: National War Memorial, Wellington
10:50 Song dedicated to Ta Bom Gillies
Sir Bom Gillies the last remaining morehu of the 28th Māori Battalion with Te Kapahaka o Ngāti Whakaue. Photo: Kereama Wright
