Soldiers, veterans, politicians and onloookers gathered in Ypres in western Belgium on Tuesday to commemorate the 107th anniversary of the end of World War I in 1918.

They laid wreaths, often commemorative poppies, at the newly renovated Menin Gate memorial to the fallen in Ypres, a Belgian town at the heart of the fighting more or less throughout the four-year war which became synonymous with the conflict on the Western Front. 

The halt in fighting, valid as of 11 a.m. local time on November 11, became known as Armistice Day and was also adopted by a series of countries as a day to honor veterans more generally — whether as Veterans Day in the US or Remembrance Day in France and in Commonwealth member states like the UK, South Africa, Australia and New Zealand.

It's a public holiday in France, the US and Belgium, while the UK holds its major ceremonies on the nearest Sunday each year but observes two minutes' silence at 11 a.m. on the 11th.

Ceremonies around Europe and beyond

Soldiers and politicians laid wreaths at Ypres' Menin Gate, with bagpipes and bugles sounding as ranks marched beneath the structure inscribed with the names of tens of thousands of soldiers who were killed but left without graves as their remains were not recovered. 

A choir also sang John Lennon's "Imagine," and a Belgian guitarist played a rendition of Bob Dylan's scathing anti-war anthem "Masters of War." Flanders' Minister-President Matthias Diependaele was the highest-ranking local politician in attendance. Belgium's King Philippe led the memorial at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in Brussels to the south.

In Paris, French President Emmanuel Macron laid a wreath at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier under the Arc de Triomphe, lighting the eternal flame at the memorial engraved with the words: "Here rests a French soldier who died for the nation." 

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese attended a ceremony at the Australian War Memorial in Canberra, while the Sydney Opera House's sails were lit up with poppies and traffic was stopped at key sections of the Melbourne Central Business District. 

"We remember every young Australian denied the chance to grow old, and every Australian who came home but never fully left the battle," Albanese said.

While King Charles and his heir William the Prince of Wales were on the streets of London outside the Cenotaph for the main ceremonies on Sunday, Catherine the Princess of Wales attended an Armistice Day event with veterans in Staffordshire on Tuesday. 

Veterans Day commemorations were set to follow later on Tuesday in the US.

'War to end all wars' that ushered in modern destruction 

Almost 10 million soldiers died in the 1914-1918 war that pitted the armies of France, the British Empire, Russia and eventually the US against a German-led coalition including the Austro-Hungarian and Ottoman empires, as well as Bulgaria. Hundreds of thousands died on the Ypres Salient alone. 

Known at the time as the Great War or the "war to end all wars," it was also the first conflict on such a scale that began to usher in more modern, industrialized means of fighting that would come to define World War II and subsequent 20th century conflicts. 

The earliest iterations of tanks and planes took to the battlefields for the first time. Poison gas was used by both sides. Zeppelins flew over major cities like London, doing little real damage but foreshadowing the widespread urban aerial bombardment of future wars. Aerial reconnaissance made artillery more accurate and devastating. And early automatic weapons like machine guns met with old-fashioned infantry tactics with disastrous consequences for the advancing troops.

Edited by: Dmytro Hubenko