TOKYO – The Tokyo Paralympics will begin Tuesday night following a one-year postponement due to the coronavirus pandemic, with unanswered questions over the safety of participants and the Japanese public during the world’s largest event for athletes with disabilities.   Tokyo will become the first city to host the Paralympics twice, having staged the 1964 edition. But this time, the….Read more

The Tokyo Paralympic Games are set to open on Aug. 24 following a one-year postponement due to the spread of the coronavirus. Like the Tokyo Olympics, the Paralympics — a sports festival for people with disabilities — will in principle be held without spectators.   Due to the effects of the delta variant strain, the infection status in Japan has….Read more

TOKYO – A recent spike in COVID-19 cases in Japan has forced 95 percent of the country’s cities and towns planning to host exchange programs with Tokyo Paralympic athletes to cancel the projects or change their formats, a Kyodo News survey showed Thursday.   Of the 101 local governments that applied for a Cabinet Secretariat-sponsored initiative aimed at promoting social….Read more

All national dailies wrote that the Imperial Household Agency said on Thursday that Emperor Naruhito will attend the opening ceremony of the Tokyo Paralympics on Aug. 24 and declare the opening of the Games as an honorary patron. Empress Masako will not participate in the ceremony. No imperial family members are planning to go to Paralympic venues to watch events….Read more

Mainichi wrote that Omi Shigeru, chairman of the GOJ subcommittee on the coronavirus response, expressed at an Upper House committee meeting on Thursday a negative view about the idea of allowing schoolchildren to participate in Tokyo Paralympics events as spectators. He reportedly said: “The infection situation is a lot worse now than it was when the Olympics were held from….Read more

NHK reported online that U.S. swimmers and track and field athletes who will compete in the Tokyo Paralympics invited the press to observe their training at Yokota AB on Wednesday. The network said about 40 swimmers and track and field athletes of Team USA have been holding pre-Paralympic training at Yokota Air Base in Fussa, Tokyo, since Aug. 11. During….Read more

TOKYO – Zakia Khudadadi, who was poised to become Afghanistan’s first female Paralympic athlete, has released a video pleading for help in reaching the Tokyo Games from the Afghan capital of Kabul after the Taliban captured the city.   Khudadadi, a 23-year-old from Herat, who competes in para-taekwondo, said she is now “imprisoned inside the house,” with relatives in Kabul,….Read more

The Tokyo Paralympics will kick off on Aug. 24 without spectators from the general public at any of the competition venues, as part of measures to deal with the novel coronavirus pandemic. Utmost efforts must be made to conduct the Games safely.   A maximum of about 4,400 athletes from approximately 160 countries and regions are scheduled to participate, and….Read more

TOKYO – A top Paralympic athlete from Georgia was arrested Monday for allegedly assaulting a security guard at a Tokyo hotel last week, police said Monday.   The man arrested is Zviad Gogotchuri, who won a gold medal in the men’s judo 90-kilogram division at the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Paralympics, the police said.   The 34-year-old judoka was set….Read more

All national papers wrote that the International Paralympic Committee, the Tokyo organizing committee, the GOJ, and the Tokyo Metropolitan Government agreed on Monday not to allow spectators at Paralympic event venues because of the ongoing fifth wave of the coronavirus outbreak. They gave up on the initial idea of allowing people to attend events in Shizuoka since the prefecture will….Read more