The DESIRS beamline of the SOLEIL synchrotron facility, equipped with a vacuum ultraviolet Fourier-transform spectrometer has been used to measure P(N″=1) (N-N″=-1) absorption transitions of the D2 molecule. Some 44 P-lines were assigned and their transition frequencies determined up to excitation energies of 134,000cm−1 above the ground state, thereby extending the earlier work by various authors, and considerably improving the spectral accuracy (<0.1cm−1). The assignments have been aided by first principles multichannel quantum defect theory (MQDT) calculations. These calculations also provide predictions of the autoionization widths of the upper levels which agree well with the observed resonance widths.