Overview

• A two-minute silence will be observed at midday on August 15 across the UK to mark the 80th anniversary of VJ Day.
• A remembrance service at the National Memorial Arboretum in Staffordshire will feature 400 armed forces personnel, a Red Arrows flypast and historic Battle of Britain Memorial Flight aircraft.
• The Department for Culture, Media and Sport and the Royal British Legion are running the ceremony, which will include Second World War veterans, VJ association members, senior politicians and military leaders.
• Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy and Defence Secretary John Healey have urged the nation to honour the courage of troops who continued fighting Japan months after VE Day.
• Organisers stress the importance of sustaining intergenerational memory of Pacific theatre sacrifices as few veterans who served in 1945 remain.