War sparked by 9/11 'not over yet'
Emotions ran high on both sides of the Atlantic today as the victims of the devastating terror attacks of September 11 were remembered five years on.
After a day of commemorative events US President George Bush was due to give a televised address telling Americans the battle against terrorism was a “struggle for civilisation” and warning that it would set the course for the 21st century.
He will vow to bring about a “shining age of human liberty“.
In New York a simple, moving ceremony at the new British Memorial Garden honoured the 67 men and women from the UK who died in the atrocities.
Around 45 family members flew to the US for a concert and service there, attended by the Duke and Duchess of York.
British widow Tracey Larkey, who lost her husband Robin in the World Trade Centre, said it was “heartbreaking” bringing her three sons up without him in New Jersey.
But the 43-year-old said she had been comforted by the low-key service at the garden, which felt more personal than the annual large-scale event at Ground Zero.
Patricia Bingley, 72, from Clacton-on-Sea, Essex, had flown to New York to remember her son Kevin Dennis, who was killed in the twin towers.
While in the city she had slipped on the floor of her hotel’s reception and broken her wrist, but said she was still glad to have come.
“It was very comforting and calming at Ground Zero,” Mrs Bingley said.
“I feel much closer to my son here in New York.”
Earlier in the day in London, friends and family of the Britons killed when hijackers crashed four planes into the World Trade Centre, the Pentagon and a Pennsylvania field gathered to pay their respects during a ceremony in Grosvenor Square, close to the US embassy.
At the permanent memorial to the dead, 67 white roses represented each of the victims, and mourners hugged and held back the tears.
A minute’s silence was held at 1.46pm (BST), the exact time the first plane hit one of the World Trade Centre towers.
Culture secretary Tessa Jowell paid tribute to the bravery and strength of the families, saying some of the rawness had perhaps now healed.
Alex Clarke, head of the British victims’ families’ organisation, who lost her daughter, Suria, in the attacks, said: “What’s five years? To us I think it is just the same. The pain is always going to be there.”
As in previous years, a solemn ceremony at Ground Zero had seen all the names of the 2,973 victims of the history’s worst terrorist atrocities read aloud, punctuated by four haunting moments of silence.
They marked the times when the twin towers were struck and subsequently collapsed, sending a huge, suffocating dust cloud billowing through Lower Manhattan’s streets.
Rudy Giuliani, who was Mayor of New York at the time, told families who gathered to cast roses into a pool in the site’s deep pit: “We’ve come back to remember the valour of those we’ve lost, those who innocently went to work that day and the brave souls who went in after them.”
Current Mayor Michael Bloomberg said: “Five years have come, and five years have gone, and still we stand together as one.
“We come back to this place to remember the heartbreaking anniversary – and each person who died here – those known and unknown to us, whose absence is always with us.”
Flowers, posters and hand-written messages from relatives adorned the wire fence around the site and an honour guard of firefighters and police officers, including 120 British bobbies took part in the ceremony.
At the Memorial Garden in Hanover Square, named by the British in 1714, Prince Andrew gave a defiant speech insisting terrorism would never change the “core values and beliefs” of Britain and America.
The pain for those who lost loved ones was “vivid and far from healed“, he said.
Mr Bush, who visited New York, Shanksville in Pennsylvania, and the defence department in Washington during the day, was set to say that the US was fighting “to maintain the way of life enjoyed by free nations“.
“Our nation has endured trials, and we face a difficult road ahead,” he will tell viewers.
“Winning this war will require the determined efforts of a unified country.
“So we must put aside our differences, and work together to meet the test that history has given us.
“We will defeat our enemies... we will protect our people... and we will lead the 21st century into a shining age of human liberty.”
America had not asked for the war and he and all Americans wished it were over.
“But the war is not over – and it will not be over until either we or the extremists emerge victorious,” Mr Bush said.
“If we do not defeat these enemies now, we will leave our children to face a Middle East overrun by terrorist states and radical dictators armed with nuclear weapons.
“We are in a war that will set the course for this new century and determine the destiny of millions across the world.”
Elsewhere, al Qaida’s number two Ayman al-Zawahri called for further violence, warning that Israel and Persian Gulf countries would be the next targets.
He told the US it had given militants “every legitimacy and every opportunity” to continue fighting.
And hardline legislators in Pakistan blamed America’s response to September 11 for “destroying peace in the entire world“.
Others used the fifth anniversary of the attacks to reappraise the political and military action that flowed from that day.
Conservative leader David Cameron gave a candid critique of the Bush administration’s approach to foreign policy.
He warned that in recent years it had too often been driven by “easy soundbites” and lacked proper “humility and patience“.
