PHOTO FEATURE: From Finnmark in the north to Oslo in the south, Norwegians were honouring their veterans and celebrating their liberation from occupation during World War II on Thursday. May 8th has long been Norway’s Liberation Day, and this year marked 80 years of freedom.
That’s not something to be taken for granted, with war in Europe, high tensions with Russia, a rise in authoritarian governments and a new, unpredictable president in the US who branded the day he launched a controversial trade war as “Liberation Day.” In Norway, the term has a much more serious meaning. Here in Bergen, the Norwegian Navy paid special attention to all the civilians who served their country through the resistance movement, the merchant marine and the so-called “Shetland shuttles” that carried refugees from Norway’s west coast to the UK and brought needed supplies and freedom fighters back again. PHOTO: Malene Hermansen Flekke/Forsvaret
There were solemn memorials and festive receptions, military formations and the awarding of medals. Much of it took place in beautiful spring weather like here in Bardufoss, where a massive and necessary increase in defense spending has sparked lots of new and expanded activity. PHOTO: Sondre Mosdal/Forsvaret
There’s still snow on the ground here in Tana, not very far west of Norway’s own border to Russia. Things have changed dramatically in the region after Russia invaded Ukraine, and local officials including Mayor Jon Erland Balto paid tribute to their freedom and to personell from the Tanafjord home guard area. PHOTO: Forsvaret
At the opposite end of the country, in Flekkefjord, the Norwegian submarine KNM Utvær surfaced to make its own tribute on Liberation- and Veterans Day on Thursday. The submarine’s crew reportedly celebrated both underwater and then above it, laying a wreath in Norwegian colours where its periscope can emerge, before battening down the hatches and diving back into its undersea patrol areas. The wreath was meant to honour “all those who gave their lives for our freedom.” PHOTO: Forsvaret/Ørjan Andreassen
This more traditional memorial ceremony was carried out in Elverum, where local veterans, civilians and military officials gathered at the Christianfjeld fortress … (PHOTO: Forsvaret/Maria Smørgrav)
…while these veterans gathered around blossoming trees at Solheim Æreskirkegård, a memorial cemetery where many war heroes from the Bergen area are buried. Norway’s Minister of Culture Lubna Jaffery took part in the ceremonies, as did Bergen Mayor Marit Warncke. PHOTO: Henrik S Andersen/Forsvaret
In the Norwegian capital of Oslo, meanwhile, both King Harald and Crown Prince Haakon attended traditional Liberation- and Veteran’s Day ceremonies while Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre spoke and medals were handed out to several military heroes who more recently have served in Afghanistan and other areas of conflict. Here’s Støre and the head of the Norwegian Parliament’s defense and foreign affairs committee, Ine Eriksen Søreide, chatting with veteran Trond Johansen during a reception for those being honoured. PHOTO: Forsvaret/Torgeir Haugaard
After reviewing the ceremonies in Oslo, the king and crown prince were driven off in their vintage Buick Roadmaster from 1939, with the iconic license plate “A-1.” They later traveled up to a forested area in Ullensaker, near Oslo’s main airport at Gardermoen, where the bodies of 173 Norwegian- 15 Soviet- and six British prisoners of war had been buried after being executed by Norway’s Nazi occupiers. Most of the Norwegians killed and buried at the site had been involved in resistance efforts and many were very young.
The discovery of the cemetery in the forest known as Trandumskogen after the war ended shocked the nation, and King Harald brought it back into the national consciousness on Liberation Day. “Did they die in vain?” asked Norway’s 88-year-old monarch who spent his own childhood in exile in the US during the war years. “No, not if we manage to stand together and protect what they died for,” which was the freedom and democracy that was restored for Norwegians on May 8, 1945.
“I am the third Norwegian king who has the motto Alt for Norge,” King Harald continued. “That means, in its greatest consequence, to offer everything, also one’s life, for Norway’s freedom and independence.” Those who lost their lives during the war were among the many, King Harald said, “who gave their lives so that we today can live as free people in a free and independent Norway. We owe them all an enormous ‘thank you.’ They gave everything for Norway.”
NewsinEnglish.no/Nina Berglund
