John McCain, the veteran senator who emerged as the most visible Republican critic of Donald Trump, was laid to rest at the US Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland, after a private ceremony on Sunday.

Four naval jets performed an aerial salute with a single F-18 fighter peeling off into the sun as part of the missing man formation.

The funeral concluded a week of memorials for McCain, who died on August 25, at the age of 81, from brain cancer.

He trained at the naval academy, graduating in 1958, before serving in Vietnam as a fighter pilot.

A horse-drawn caisson carrying the senator's casket led a procession of mourners from the academy's chapel to its cemetery following a private service.