World
Americans have commemorated the 13th anniversary of the 9/11 terror attacks with ceremonies in New York and Washington. The BBC writes:
The ceremonies began just before 09:00 local (13:00 GMT) and included a reading out of the names of those who died in the attacks. In New York, the ceremony was held at the new National September 11 Museum.
In Washington, President Barack Obama led mourners in a commemoration held on the White House lawn. Ceremonies also took place at the Pentagon and in Pennsylvania where one of the hijacked planes crashed.
The anniversary comes just hours after Mr Obama laid out his strategy to counter Islamic State militants in Iraq and Syria.
"Our objective is clear: We will degrade and ultimately destroy [IS] through a comprehensive and sustained counterterrorism strategy," he said in his address to the nation on Wednesday night.
Ceremonies began with a moment of silence at 08:46 am (12:46 GMT), the time when the first hijacked plane hit the World Trade Center.
Little about the annual ceremony at ground zero changed, but so much around it has. The Associated Press reports:
For the first time, the National September 11 Museum — which includes gut-wrenching artifacts and graphic photos of the attacks — will be open on the anniversary.
Fences around the memorial plaza have come down, integrating the sacred site more fully with the streets of Manhattan while completely opening it up to the public and camera-wielding tourists.
A new mayor is in office, Bill de Blasio, one far less linked to the attacks and their aftermath than his immediate predecessors. And finally, a nearly completed One World Trade Center has risen 1,776 feet above ground zero and will be filled with office workers by this date in 2015, another sign that a page in the city's history may be turning.
For some who lost loved ones in the attacks, the increasing feel of a return to normalcy in the area threatens to obscure the tragedy that took place there and interfere with their grief.
"Instead of a quiet place of reflection, it's where kids are running around," said Nancy Nee, whose firefighter brother, George Cain, was killed in the attacks. "Some people forget this is a cemetery. I would never go to the Holocaust museum and take a selfie." But for others, the charges are an important part of the healing process. "When I first saw (One World Trade Center), it really made my heart sing," said Debra Burlingame, whose brother Charles Burlingame was the pilot of the plane that crashed into the Pentagon. "It does every time I see it because it's so symbolic of what the country went through."
