Colne Valley Cemetery in Boezinge, near Ypres, has been entirely leveled up and will therefore be officially reopened on Wednesday 22 June 2016 at 10hrs in the presence of the British Ambassador Alison Rose. Next to this, the new educational brochure created by the Commonwealth War Graves Commission (CWGC) for children between 6 and 8 years old, will be presented.

As Colne Valley Cemetery was more and more subject to severe flooding over the past years, which made access to the site impossible for longer periods, the CWGC decided to raise the ground level with 1,2 metres on average. This would ensure that the 47 soldiers buried there would have a decent final resting place, accessible for visitors all year round. Therefore all headstones and structural features were dismantled and reconstructed after the level-up. All this was made possible with the financial support of the Province of West-Flanders. The City of Ypres played its role too by facilitating and funding a pumping station to extract away the excess water.

Although this is a unique project that has never been carried out by the CWGC before, it has already proven its success the last couple of weeks. Despite the heavy rainfall, causing a lot of flooding in the surrounding area, the cemetery was not awashed.

To make the site more accessible, not only physically, but also "virtually", a unique educational brochure has been developed in cooperation with Miguel Bouttry from Rent a Guide. This brochure is available in English, Dutch, French and German and can be obtained in the CWGC Ieper office, the Ieper Tourist Office and "Klein Zwaanhof", the entry point for the trail "Ypres Salient North".

Apart from the British Ambassador and other dignitaries, the reopening ceremony will be attended by Saint John’s School from Kent and a local primary school from Boezinge.

The Commonwealth War Graves Commission (www.cwgc.org)

The CWGC is responsible for the commemoration of almost 1.7 million members of the Commonwealth forces who gave their lives in the two world wars. The graves and memorials of these men and women, who came from all parts of the Commonwealth are found around the globe in more than 150 countries. The CWGC operates in over 23,000 locations across all continents except for Antarctica. The CWGC has two area offices in Western Europe, one in Ieper (Belgium) and one in Beaurains (France). Apart from Belgium and France the Western Europe Area is also responsible for Germany, The Netherlands, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Monaco, Poland, and Switzerland.