LONDON (AP) — Queen Elizabeth II and Britain's political leaders have led the country's Remembrance Sunday service for war dead.

The queen, dressed in black, watched from a balcony as her son and heir Prince Charles laid a wreath of scarlet poppies on the Cenotaph war memorial in central London.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson, opposition Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn and other politicians paused campaigning for Britain's Dec. 12 election to join the ceremony on a cold, sunny morning.

A military band played as the politicians, religious leaders and diplomats from the Commonwealth of former British colonies laid wreaths on the Portland stone monument inscribed with the words "the glorious dead."

The ceremony takes place every year on the nearest Sunday to the anniversary of World War I's end on Nov. 11, 1918.