US pays tribute to 9/11 victims 15 years after attacks

REUTERS: Americans commemorated the 15th anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks on Sunday with the recital of the names of the dead, tolling church bells and a tribute in lights at the site where New York City’s massive twin towers collapsed.

As classical music drifted across the 9/11 Memorial plaza in lower Manhattan, family members and first responders slowly read the names and delivered personal memories of the almost 3,000 victims killed in the worst attack on US soil since the 1941 bombing of Pearl Harbor.

Tom Acquarviva lost his 29-year-old son Paul, who worked at financial services firm Canter Fitzgerald on the 101st to 105th floors of the North Tower, just above where the first plane struck. Acquarviva was one of 658 Cantor Fitzgerald employees killed in the attack.

“We miss him terribly. Terribly, terribly, terribly. Not a day goes by that we don’t remember him,” Acquarviva told Reuters. But he said he felt a sense of hope: “There are more people here today than there ever have been.”

The ceremony paused for six moments of silence: four to mark the exact times four hijacked planes were crashed into the World Trade Center, the Pentagon near Washington D.C., and a Pennsylvania field. The last two record when the North and South towers of the Trade Center crumpled.

A couple embraces as they stand at the National September 11 Memorial and Museum on the 15th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks in Manhattan, New York, U.S., September 11, 2016. REUTERS

It was held by two reflecting pools with waterfalls that now stand in the towers’ former footprints, and watched over by an honor guard of police and firefighters.

More than 340 firefighters and 60 police were killed on the that sunny Tuesday morning in 2001. Many of the first responders died while running up stairs in the hope of reaching victims trapped on the towers’ higher floors.

At the Pentagon, a trumpet played as U.S. President Barack Obama took part in a wreath-laying ceremony.

“Fifteen years may seem like a long time. But for the families who lost a piece of their heart that day, I imagine it can seem like just yesterday,” Obama said.

No public officials spoke at the New York ceremony, in keeping with a tradition that began in 2012. But many dignitaries attended, including Republican presidential hopeful Donald Trump and his Democratic rival Hillary Clinton.

“We’ll never forget the horror of Sept. 11, 2001,” Clinton said in a brief statement. “Let’s honour the lives and tremendous spirit of the victims and responders.”

Trump said in a statement that it was a day of sadness and remembrance, but also of resolve.

“Our solemn duty on behalf of all those who perished ... is to work together as one nation to keep all of our people safe from an enemy that seeks nothing less than to destroy our way of life,” Trump said.

Houses of worship throughout the city tolled their bells at 8:46 a.m. EDT (1246 GMT), the time American Airlines Flight 11 slammed into the North Tower.

A man arrives at the World Trade Centre complex on the morning of the 15th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks in Manhattan, New York, September 11, 2016. REUTERS

A second pause came at 9:03 a.m. (1303 GMT), when United Airlines Flight 175 struck the South Tower. American Airlines Flight 77 hit the Pentagon at 9:37 a.m. (1337 GMT), then the South Tower collapsed at 9:59 a.m. (1359 GMT).

At 10:03 a.m. (1403 GMT) United Flight 93 crashed near Shanksville, Pennsylvania, and the final moment of silence was observed at 10:28 a.m. (1428 GMT) when the North Tower fell.

As evening falls across New York City on Sunday, spotlights will project two giant beams of light into the night sky to represent the fallen twin towers, fading away at dawn.

In the twin towers’ place now rises the 104-story 1 World Trade Center. Also known as the Freedom Tower, it is the tallest skyscraper in the Western Hemisphere, at 1,776 feet (541 meters). Fifteen years after the attack, the US government marked its return to the site on Friday, moving its New York City offices there.

Nineteen hijackers died in the attack, later claimed by Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda, which led directly to the US war in Afghanistan and indirectly to the invasion of Iraq.

In Kabul, the top American commander in Afghanistan, General John Nicholson, paid tribute to members of the NATO-led coalition and Afghan security forces who had been killed since the Taliban regime fell.

But in an address which touched on his own experience as an officer in Afghanistan, stretching back a decade, he also underlined how far from peace the country remains.

“As we know, sadly, the number of terrorist groups has only grown since 9/11,” he said. “Of the 98 groups now designated globally, 20 are in this region, the Afpak region.”

US returns to 1 World Trade Centre 15 years after attacks

Reuters: The US Federal Government on Friday marked its return to the rebuilt 1 World Trade Center, moving its New York City offices back to Lower Manhattan 15 years after the Sept. 11 attacks that had reduced the site to rubble.

“Today is meant to be an uplifting day, a sign of our determination to move forward,” said U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security Jeh Johnson at an event on the 63rd floor.

Also known as the Freedom Tower, the 104-story 1 World Trade Center is the tallest skyscraper in the Western Hemisphere, at 1,776 feet (541 meters).

Construction began in 2006 and the building opened in 2014 when media company Conde Nast, the anchor tenant, moved in. About 67% of its three million square feet is now leased.

The Federal Government was one of the first tenants in the original World Trade Center in the 1970s, said Port Authority of New York and New Jersey Executive Director Patrick Foye. The General Services Administration had leased space at 6 World Trade Center before it was destroyed in the attacks.

The Government became the third tenant in the new building when the General Services Administration signed the lease on its behalf in 2012.

One World Trade Center is seen reflected in the museum at the National September 11 Memorial, ahead of the 15th anniversary of the attacks in Manhattan, New York, September 10, 2016. REUTERS

On Sept. 11, 2001, four US commercial airplanes were hijacked and crashed into the World Trade Center’s twin towers, as well as the Pentagon building near Washington D.C. and a field in Pennsylvania, killing nearly 3,000 people.

The Federal Government’s return to the World Trade Center sends a “message to the entire world that we will never, ever renounce our values or be afraid,” New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio said.

More than 1,000 employees of the GSA, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, and U.S. Customs and Border Patrol had moved into the space by March, a spokeswoman said. The lease for the approximately 220,000 square feet is $15 million per year.

Still, not everyone was happy about the return of Government agencies to the building. In 2015, six GSA employees sued to try to block the move, saying they feared the rebuilt tower would again be a target for possible attacks. A federal judge in Manhattan threw out the case in June.

In Washington on Friday, members of the U.S. House of Representatives gathered on the exterior steps to the chamber for a remembrance ceremony and sang God Bless America.

Recalling “that terrible day,” House Speaker Paul Ryan, a Republican, spoke of the first responders “who went rushing into danger when the whole world was running away from it.”

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, a Democrat, told the assembly that because of the first responders’ heroic efforts, “Americans rose united” from the rubble of the attacks.

For one of those first responders, Michael Byrne, a former New York City fire-fighter who is now a senior FEMA official, the return of Federal Government employees to the World Trade Center site is deeply personal.

At the event in Lower Manhattan, Byrne said that as he walks past the memorial to his office each morning, he bids “hello” to friends who died in the 2001 attacks and asks for their blessing.

“We feel the renewed commitment in this beautiful building to continuing the mission for which our former friends gave their life,” he said.