UK veteran: Dresden bombings 'made me ashamed'

Sixty-eight years ago today, British and American aircraft dropped thousands of tons of high-explosive bombs on the German town of Dresden.

The fire storm it unleashed destroyed six square miles of the city centre and killed an estimated 25,000 people, almost all of them were civilians.

Victor Gregg was a soldier in the British 10th Parachute Regiment when he was captured at Arnhem in 1944. As a prisoner of war he worked in a town near Dresden.

After getting caught sabotaging a factory he was sent for execution in Dresden on the day the air raids began.

Speaking to Today presenter Justin Webb, Mr Gregg described how survived the Dresden bombings but he is still angry about them and about Britain's failure to say clearly and openly that they were wrong and should not have happened.

This is an extended version of the broadcast interview.

First broadcast on BBC Radio 4's Today Programme on Wednesday 13 February 2013.