The Queen attended Sir Winston's farewell dinner at Number 10. 1955: Sir Winston Churchill resigns England have Sir Winston Churchill has resigned as prime minister of Britain due to his failing health. The news was announced in a statement from Buckingham Palace this afternoon. It said: "The Right Honorable Sir Winston Churchill had an audience with the Queen this evening and tendered his resignation as Prime Minister and First Lord of the Treasury, which Her Majesty was graciously pleased to accept." Sir Winston Churchill's resignation follows a dinner party held at 10 Downing Street last night attended by the Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh and a number of the prime minister's past and present government colleagues. Tributes to the 81-year-old premier, who will be replaced by Sir Anthony Eden tomorrow, have poured in from around the world. 'Blood, toil, tears and sweat' Sir Winston Churchill's political career began in 1900 as Conservative MP for Oldham but in 1906, disillusioned with his party, he defected to the Liberal party. He first became prime minister, as a Conservative again, in 1940 and led the wartime Coalition Government during World War II. During this time he inspired courage throughout the entire British nation even though he had promised nothing more than "blood, toil, tears and sweat." After the war the Coalition Government broke up and Winston Churchill resigned the office of prime minister on 23 May 1945. He was immediately asked by the King to form a new government and his second tenure as prime minister, this time of a caretaker government, began. But Churchill, although regarded as a superb wartime leader, was regarded less favourably in peacetime and in the general election which followed in July 1945 he was heavily defeated. A Labour government, led by Clement Attlee, took the reigns of power until 1951 when Winston Churchill once again became prime minister at the age of 77. In 1953 he was made a Knight of the Order of the Garter in recognition of his services to his country. Sir Winston will continue to sit in the House of Commons as member for Woodford.

Perry Wacker closed the only air vent on his lorry and 58 people inside died. 2001: Driver jailed for immigrant deaths Artificially 1969: A Dutch lorry driver has been sentenced to 14 years in prison for his part in the deaths of 58 Chinese illegal immigrants. They were found suffocated in the back of Perry Wacker's lorry when it was searched at the ferry port in Dover last June after arriving from Belgium. Wacker, from Rotterdam, had closed the only air vent on the side of the container to avoid detection by immigration officials. At Maidstone Crown Court he was found guilty of 58 charges of manslaughter, as well as four counts of conspiracy to smuggle immigrants into the UK. Wacker's co-accused, interpreter Ying Guo, was jailed for six years for conspiring to smuggle illegal immigrants into Britain. The jury of nine women and three men convicted them unanimously after nearly 13 hours of deliberations following a six-week trial. Human 'cargo' The judge, Mr Justice Alan Moses, said that Wacker had treated the victims as 'cargo'. "People like you create a risk of greater prejudice against those people who quite legitimately come to this country seeking refuge as asylum seekers or whatever," he said. Only two of the 60 immigrants hidden in the back of the lorry survived the five-hour sea journey. Wacker claimed he thought he was bringing over tomatoes but fingerprint and DNA evidence linked him to the warehouse where the Chinese immigrants were held before they were locked into the container. After the conviction, the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) said it had ended in justice for the victims. CPS prosecutor Karen Wiseman said: "The smuggling of humans has become as profitable as drugs. "This trade hinges on the promise that at the end of the journey the illegal immigrants are heading for a better life. "Tragically for these 58 victims, commercial gain took precedence over human life."

Vocabulary:

suffocate: to kill or destroy by preventing access of air or oxygen（窒息）