Tokyo, 13 February 2020 – The Tokyo Organising Committee of the Olympic and Paralympic Games
(Tokyo 2020) today announced that Futaba town in Fukushima, a municipality evacuated in the wake of
the Fukushima nuclear disaster in 2011, will be added to the Olympic Torch Relay route on 26 March
2020, its opening day. Last month, the government announced it would lift its evacuation order for certain
parts of Futaba town and it was subsequently decided to add these to the Olympic Torch Relay route
following a request from the governor of Fukushima prefecture.
Starting out at the J-Village National Training Centre in Fukushima Prefecture, a facility that has become
a symbol of Fukushima’s reconstruction, the Olympic flame will traverse 859 local municipalities across
all 47 prefectures of Japan, passing by many of the nation’s most famous and cherished sights over a
period of 121 days.
In addition to building excitement across the country ahead of the Tokyo 2020 Games and promoting the
Olympic values, the Olympic Torch Relay aims to demonstrate solidarity with the regions still recovering
from the 2011 earthquake and tsunami under its slogan "Hope Lights Our Way." During its journey
through Fukushima prefecture, the Relay will pass through the city of Iwaki and the towns of Naraha,
Hirono, Okuma, Futaba, Namie and Tomioka, as well as the villages of Kawauchi and Katsurao. Its
journey through the prefecture will end at the celebration venue of Hibarigahara, the main site of the
"Soma Nomaoi" wild horse festival in Minamisoma city.
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