{"id":63195,"date":"2017-01-14T06:00:14","date_gmt":"2017-01-14T06:00:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/usa.timesofnews.com\/?p=63195"},"modified":"2017-01-14T06:00:14","modified_gmt":"2017-01-14T06:00:14","slug":"registration-required-for-vimy-ridge-100th-anniversary-ceremony-in-france","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/usa.timesofnews.com\/breaking-news\/political\/registration-required-for-vimy-ridge-100th-anniversary-ceremony-in-france.html","title":{"rendered":"Registration required for Vimy Ridge 100th anniversary ceremony in France"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Veterans Affairs Canada says security concerns in France have led to a mandatory registration requirement for people who want to attend the Vimy centenary ceremony.<\/p>\n<p>People who want to attend the ceremonies at the Canadian National Vimy Memorial in northern France will have to register with their full name, date of birth, place of birth, nationality and\u00a0email\u00a0address on the Veterans Affairs Canada\u00a0website.<\/p>\n<p>The deadline for registration is Feb. 28.<\/p>\n<p>The Battle of\u00a0Vimy\u00a0Ridge began\u00a0on April 9, 1917, and lasted four days. Canadian soldiers took the ridge but the effort\u00a0came with significant\u00a0losses \u2014 3,600 Canadian soldiers died and 7,000 were wounded.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Peter Mills, special adviser for the 2017 Events Commemorative Task Force, says security concerns in France prompted the measure.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;There&#8217;s a security threat level in France that has been assessed that requires significant planning around any major public event,&#8221;\u00a0Mills said in an interview with CBC News.<\/p>\n<p>France has been under a <a href=\"javascript:void(0)\">state of emergency<\/a> since the November\u00a02015 attacks Paris. It was extended to cover the Euro Cup soccer tournament last year, again after an\u00a0attack in Nice, and again into 2017 to cover the upcoming national elections.<\/p>\n<p>Registration was also required for the commemoration of the <a href=\"javascript:void(0)\">Battle of Beaumont-Hamel<\/a>\u00a0in France and a joint British-French event marking the\u00a0100th\u00a0anniversary of the Battle of the Somme, which happened last year.\u00a0<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>CBC ARCHIVES | <a href=\"javascript:void(0)\">Canada remembers WW1<\/a><\/strong><\/li>\n<li><strong><a href=\"javascript:void(0)\">Marking the 100th anniversary of Beaumont-Hamel<\/a><\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Mills said the ceremony will honour the significance of Canada&#8217;s role in the Battle of Vimy Ridge and the First World War more broadly \u2014 as well as the role the battle played in shaping Canada&#8217;s identity.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;There will also be a focus on thinking about the loss and cost of for those who stayed behind on the homefront and the effect of a war who drew people from coast to coast to coast overseas.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p \/>\n<h2>Planning and precaution<\/h2>\n<p>Veterans Affairs is expecting 25,000 people to attend the event, which will include performances, delegations from the Canadian and French governments and other VIPs.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong><a href=\"javascript:void(0)\">Canada&#8217;s last First World War veteran dies<\/a><\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>There is no cap on attendance for the ceremony, but registration is being used to co-ordinate logistics, including transportation to the site on April 9.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;If someone doesn&#8217;t register, unfortunately, they aren&#8217;t going to be able to attend,&#8221; Mill said.<\/p>\n<p> <img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/usa.timesofnews.com\/wp-content\/plugins\/RSSPoster_PRO\/cache\/f0f98_vimy-monument.jpg\" alt=\"Vimy monument\" width=\"100%\" \/><\/p>\n<p class=\"figure-caption\">The Vimy monument lists the names of Canadian soldiers who died in France and whose remains were never found. (Racheal McCaig Photography)<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;They&#8217;ll receive an e-ticket and they&#8217;ll need to be bring their ticket with them when they come to the point of arrivals and take their transport onto the site.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Mills said the French government will be controlling access to the site and attendees will be screened in advance.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong><a href=\"javascript:void(0)\"><span>Vimy<\/span>\u00a0Ridge shock-and-awe remembered<\/a><\/strong><\/li>\n<li><strong><a href=\"javascript:void(0)\">Keeping the memory of the First World War alive<\/a><\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&#8220;Canadians are vetted under a Canadian process and French nationals are vetted under a French process,&#8221; he said.<\/p>\n<p>Mills said registration opened this week and response\u00a0has\u00a0been quick,\u00a0with thousands of people visiting the site.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Unfortunately, we don&#8217;t have any sort of means to identify all of those would have had ancestors [who fought at Vimy], but we are getting out proactively to reach out to people,&#8221; Mills said.<\/p>\n<h2>Restrictions around site<\/h2>\n<p>Access to the\u00a0Canadian National Vimy\u00a0Memorial will be restricted from April 1 to April 10, 2017, for set up and takedown related to the centennial events.<\/p>\n<p>The site will be closed to the general public from April 6 to 9.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Mills said Canadian who can&#8217;t make the trip to France can attend several local Vimy commemoration ceremonies across the country and a national event in Ottawa.<\/p>\n<p>He said similar registration will likely also be required for the centenary ceremonies for the Battle of Dieppe and is under consideration\u00a0for the Battle of Paeschendaele, in Belgium, which will also take place this year.<\/p>\n<p \/>\n<p \/>\n<p \/>\n<p \/>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Veterans Affairs Canada says security concerns in France have led to a mandatory registration requirement for people who want to attend the Vimy centenary ceremony. People who want to attend the ceremonies at the Canadian National Vimy Memorial in northern France will have to register with their full name, date of birth, place of birth, [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":63199,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[84],"class_list":["post-63195","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-political","tag-political"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/usa.timesofnews.com\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63195","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/usa.timesofnews.com\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/usa.timesofnews.com\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usa.timesofnews.com\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usa.timesofnews.com\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=63195"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/usa.timesofnews.com\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63195\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usa.timesofnews.com\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/63199"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/usa.timesofnews.com\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=63195"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usa.timesofnews.com\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=63195"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usa.timesofnews.com\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=63195"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}