Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern will be attending the land wars commemoration on Monday

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said that the Government is particularly focused on ensuring that New Zealand understands its own history and commemorate it.

The Prime Minister's attendance at an official commemoration of the New Zealand land wars is an important step to helping people understand the country's history.

This is according to a spokesperson for Jacinda Ardern, who will personally be attending the event in Taranaki on Monday.

This is the third time the event has been held and each year the commemorations take place in a different part of the country.

This year, it will be held at Te Kōhia pā in Waipā – where the first shots of the New Zealand land wars were fired.

In the mid 1800s, there was a series of bloody battles between Māori tribes and the Crown over sovereignty – these are commonly referred to as the New Zealand land wars.

The commemorations are on the same day as the anniversary of the signing of the 1835 Declaration of Independence.

A spokesperson for Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said the Government is particularly focused on ensuring that New Zealand understands its own history and commemorates it.

This is one of the major reasons why she will be attending the event on Monday.

The spokesman said there would be many people across the country that have limited knowledge of the land wars, and the commemorations are a good way to ensure New Zealand's history is understood.

The national day of commemoration came about after a group of students from Otorohanga College started a petition, urging the Government to officially mark the day.

The petition, which received 12,000 signatures, was delivered to Parliament in December 2015.

Ardern's attendance at the commemorations comes after Parliament yesterday passed into law an apology from the Crown for the land invasions of Parihaka in the late 1800s.

There were emotional scenes in the House after the bill – which formalised an apology first given two years ago – unanimously passed its third reading.

Roughly 200 people from Parihaka were in Parliament to witness, what Greens co-leader Marama Davidson called "an historic day".

The bill apologised for responding to "peace with tyranny, to unity with division, and to autonomy with oppression".

In 1881, roughly 1600 soldiers raided and evicted Māori who had gathered to resist the Crown.