Princes Charles and Harry join world leaders to mark centenary of Gallipoli campaign
Prince Charles and Prince Harry joined world leaders in Turkey to mark the centenary of one of the First World War's bloodiest campaigns in Gallipoli.
The Prince of Wales paid tribute to the "heroism" of the tens of thousands who lost their lives.
From the ceremony, ITV News correspondent Dan Rivers reports:
The Prince of Wales laid flowers on the graves of British and Irish soldiers who died 100 years ago storming the beaches at the start of the disastrous Gallipoli Campaign.
He was joined by Prince Harry and the President of Ireland Michael Higgins at "V" Beach, close to the tip of the Turkish Peninsula, at a cemetery which is half the size of a football pitch but contains the bodies of almost 700 men.
In late evening spring sunshine, with birds tweeting and the smell of spring flowers in the air, the poignant visit came as the culmination of a day of remembrance.
The calm, low-key visit to V Beach where Royal Dublin and Royal Munster Fusiliers led the way, and who were so badly caught in enemy fire that the sea turned red, was a contrast to the pomp of the international service joined by Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan and the Prime Ministers of New Zealand and Australia.
Earlier, the princes met descendants of British and Irish Gallipoli veterans on board the Royal Navy's flagship HMS Bulwark, anchored in the middle of the Dardanelles straits which were the cause of the battle in 1915.
The idea to knock the Ottomans out of the war and open a sea route to Russia was Winston Churchill's but because of hopeless planning, hostile conditions and heroic defending, eight bloody months later the operation was halted, having cost 58,000 Allied lives.
Some 87,000 Turks died defending their home soil.
The amphibious assault started at dawn on April 25 1915 as wave after wave of British and Irish, French, Australian, New Zealand and Indian troops attacked heavily defended beaches, through barbed wire, and raced up cliffs through scrub.
Lyn Edmonds, whose grandfather Private Benjamin Hurt was a Royal Dublin Fusilier who fought at Gallipoli, has tried to increase knowledge of Britain and Ireland's contribution to the campaign.
She was moved to see the efforts today to recognise the sacrifices made."I still think we have a long way to go to dispel a lot of the myths," she said.
"But to be here with the princes, on HMS Bulwark, with the First Sea Lord, is amazing, it feels unreal."
Charles joined the Turkish president at the huge Canakkale Martyrs' Memorial, which commemorates thousands of local men who were buried in unmarked graves.
The Prince gave a speech, praising the heroism and humanity shown by soldiers from both sides a century ago.
He said: "All those who fought at Gallipoli, whether landing on or defending its shores, hailed from so many different nations and peoples, from an almost infinite variety of backgrounds and walks of life. And, whilst their origins were diverse, they were all thrust into a very different world than they would have ever known or imagined before.
"Indeed, in 1915, both sides were united by challenges that neither could escape - the devastating firepower of modern warfare, the ghastly diseases that added to the death tolls, the devastating summer heat which brought plagues of insects, and in winter, just before the battle ended, the biting cold that many wrote was worse than the shelling itself."
Later, at V Beach, the Prince of Wales laid white carnations on some of the graves, as did Mr Higgins.