Services were held across the country. Photo / Dean Purcell
Governor-General Dame Cindy Kiro laid a wreath at the Tomb of the Unknown Warrior during the Armistice Day commemoration at Pukeahu National War Memorial in Wellington today to honour New Zealand's fallen soldiers.
The thousands of Kiwis who were killed or injured in World War I were remembered at events across New Zealand - although services in Auckland were limited by Covid-19 restrictions.
A small group was led by Auckland RSA President Graham Gibson at a Remembrance Day event at the Auckland War Memorial Museum and former All Black Wayne Shelford laid a wreath at the base of the Cenotaph as the group in attendance maintained strict distancing protocols.
Auckland Mayor Phil Goff recorded a video message in lieu of his attendance at the Cenotaph in which he paid tribute to the 18,000 killed and the many thousands physically and mentally injured during that war. He also mentioned the millions who died from the Spanish flu pandemic that broke out across the world following the war, drawing a parallel to the situation we face today.
"Because of another pandemic, Covid, we are not able to gather collectively to commemorate the war and to acknowledge the sacrifice and contribution made by those Kiwis so many years ago,' Goff says in the video.
"But we will still do so individually and we will remember them for the courage they showed and the fact that they died rather than let their mates or their country down.
"So today, as we remember the fallen, and those that made those sacrifices let us recommit ourselves to creating a better world free of war, a world of peace and justice guide the actions of nations, lest we forget."
The Waipā campus in Rotorua is 'the only facility of its kind in the Southern Hemisphere'.