The Prince of Wales and the Duchess of Cornwall paid tribute on Wednesday to the British victims of the devastating 2004 tsunami, at the opening of a new memorial.
Charles laid a wreath at the Natural History Museum memorial in London, for the 155 Britons who died in the Indian Ocean disaster.
Overall more than 225,000 were killed when giant waves engulfed a vast region from Indonesia in the east to Somalia, leaving a trail of destruction. Millions more were left homeless.
Prince Charles, who saw the devastation first hand when he visited Sri Lanka in February 2005, was joined by hundreds of bereaved friends and relatives for the opening of the memorial.
The names of the British victims are engraved on the floor beneath a 115 tonne granite monolith in the grounds of the museum.
In an emotional exchange between the The Duchess and the mother of one of the victims, both women found themselves in tears.
Yvette Bent lost her daughter Sarah in the disaster after the 19-year-old travelled to Thailand to meet her boyfriend, Robert Rowbottom, who was also killed. Neither of their bodies have been recovered.
"It is hugely important," she said. "Because neither of them have been found, we have no where to go. It has been hugely important for us to have a place."
Michael Holland, the son-in-law of filmmaker Richard Attenborough, who lost his daughter, wife and mother in the tsunami, was also at the ceremony.
The chair of the memorial project board for the charity Tsunami Support UK, said he hoped the monument was "uplifting" to the bereaved families.
"We learn to manage the grief and pain, but it never leaves us," he said. "Nor would we wish it to. It is our connection with those that we have loved and lost."
Source: AFP European Edition
