According to the general plan of torch relay, a lighting ceremony of the Beijing Olympic Games will be held in Olympia, Greece on March 24, after which a six-day relay is to kick off in Greece. The Olympic flame handover ceremony will be held in Athens on March 30. The BOCOG delegation, headed by Mr. Liu Qi, member of the Political Bureau of CPC Central Committee, Secretary of CPC Beijing Municipal Committee and President of BOCOG is to take part in the two events.

The flame will arrive in Beijing on March 31, where a grand ceremony will be held to welcome the flame and officially launch the torch relay of the 2008 Olympic Games.?State leaders will attend the ceremony.

1. Relay outside the mainland of China

From April 1 to May 3, the Olympic torch will be relayed in 21 cities outside the mainland of China. The BOCOG torch relay operation team will take the flame onboard the chartered Air China airplane, traveling to 19 cities in five continents as well as Hong Kong and Macao. The journey is expected to last for 33 days with 42 celebration events to be held along the way, covering a total length of 97,000 km with the participation of more than 2,000 torchbearers.

2. Relay within the mainland of China

The Olympic flame, after the relay outside the mainland of China, will arrive in Sanya City of Hainan Province on May 3rd. From May 4 onwards, BOCOG torch relay operation team will take the flame to 113 cities and areas in 31 provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities, according to the pre-planned route by transport means such as airplane, railway and road. The flame is planned to stay in each province (autonomous region or municipality) for an average of three days. Relay will last for four days in each of Sichuan, Henan, Shandong and Guangdong provinces (where the population is over 80 million) and two days in Shanghai, Tianjin and Chongqing respectively. The flame will be back in Beijing on August 6 and relayed within the city for three days. On the evening of August 8, the flame will reach the main stadium of the Beijing Olympic Games opening ceremony and light up the main cauldron, which will be on until the closing ceremony of the Games. The relay within the mainland of China is to last for 97 days with over 19,000 torchbearers, covering more than 40,000 km.

(China.org.cn March 19, 2008)