One of the most infamous battles of the Land Wars has been remembered in Tauranga this morning - the Battle of Gate Pa.

Heavily armed pro-Russian gunmen last night seized another town in east Ukraine, storming the town hall in Kostyantynivka and setting up barricades.

Pro-Russian gunmen in Ukraine demanded a "prisoner" exchange for a team of kidnapped Western officials yesterday.

New Zealanders gathered in their thousands to celebrate Anzac Day at dawn services around the country on Friday, and now attention turns to preparations for next year's centenary of the World War I Gallipoli campaign.

As a young boy Willie Apiata sat close to his grandfather on Anzac Day and was puzzled by the laughter that mixed with sadness, and eyes that "watered just a little bit".

One person died at today's dawn Anzac service in Wanganui.

Married for just a month, he couldn't wait to enlist.

Kiwis commemorate April 25 as one today, from the child learning about war history, to the veterans who saw fighting at close quarters

A surf boat crew will stage a symbolic row down Auckland's North Shore tomorrow, as they prepare for a commemorative international race in Turkey next year.

With a generous smile and glinting eyes, Dipak Ghale speaks passionately and softly about the importance of family.

The desperate residents of a besieged district of Damascus are expected to run out of food today.

In 1942, at the age of 49, World War One hero Ormond Burton went on trial in the Supreme Court at Wellington.

Jews have reportedly been told to "register" with pro-Russian forces in the east Ukrainian city of Donetsk, in a move condemned by the US as "grotesque and beyond unacceptable".

Ukraine's armed forces and government suffered a public humiliation yesterday after pro-Russian separatists seized six of their armoured personnel vehicles and paraded them through the streets.

A prolonged and increasingly vicious confrontation in eastern Ukraine turned into armed conflict yesterday.

To some, they are heroes ready to trade their personal liberty for the sake of high principle. To others, they are spoiled rich children, shirking their national duty on the backs of the less fortunate.

A North Korean official has been executed with a flame-thrower, South Korean media has reported.

Gallipoli means more to New Zealanders than words can convey. But when the names of Mary and Doug Hill were drawn from the ballot this week for places at the 100th Anzac Day, the moment was especially poignant.

The Prime Minister is probably not correct to say few New Zealanders know what happened at Orakau.

Poland has asked Nato to station 10,000 troops on its territory as a visible demonstration of the alliance's resolve to defend all its members after Russia's seizure of Crimea.

Vladimir Putin will not stop trying to expand Russia until he has “conquered” Belarus, the Baltic states and Finland, one of his closest former advisers has said.

On the edge of a Kabul neighbourhood an election poster of presidential candidate Abdul Rasoul Sayyaf is damaged, partly scraped away by someone trying to remove it.

The Syrian conflict encroached threateningly on Nato's eastern frontiers yesterday when Turkey shot down an Assad regime fighter jet it said had crossed into its territory.

With two grandfathers gassed in the trenches of the Great War, and a father who battled Nazis at El Alamein, Rick Ottaway never consciously made a career choice.

The role of five New Zealanders involved in the famous Great Escape from a Nazi prison camp during World War II will be recognised in a commemoration in Poland today.

He is either the unluckiest man in the British Army, or the luckiest. Warrant Officer 1 Patrick Hyde has been blown up 17 times by insurgents.