Each person's light shines together on the stage... Aichi-Nagoya Disabled AG opens

(Nagoya = Yonhap News) Reporter Kim Dong-han = A week-long sports festival where Asian disabled athletes compete and share friendship has begun in Nagoya, Japan.

The 2026 Aichi-Nagoya Games, the fifth Asian Para Games, officially began with the opening ceremony held at Nagoya Mizuho Park Athletics Stadium at 6 p.m. on the 18th.

The opening ceremony was attended by Asian Paralympic Committee (APC) Chairman Majid Rashed, Emperor Naruhito, Crown Prince Fumihito Akishinonomiya and his wife, and Aichi Prefecture Governor Hideaki Omura, chairman of the organizing committee.

In Korea, Minister of Culture, Sports and Tourism Choi Hwi-young visited the site as a government representative, along with Jeong Jin-wan, president of the Korea Sports Association for the Disabled, and APC vice-chairman Jeong Jae-jun.

The Asian Para Games are usually held every four years, but the previous 2022 Hangzhou Games were held in 2023 in the aftermath of the spread of the novel coronavirus infection (COVID-19), making it return after three years.

Approximately 4,000 athletes from 45 Asian countries and regions will participate in this competition, which will be held in Aichi Prefecture, Nagoya City, Japan, and Izu City, Shizuoka Prefecture until the 24th, competing for over 500 gold medals in 18 events.

The competition slogan is ‘Imagine One Heart.’ It contains the idea of ​​​​considering the passionate hearts of each player and uniting everyone's hearts as one.

It was paired with the 'Imagine One Asia' event of the Asian Games held in the same region earlier, emphasizing harmony and solidarity in Asia.

The opening ceremony was held under the theme of 'WABI (We Are Beautiful Individuals)', which means 'we are each beautiful in our own way', and was decorated as a stage where each person could come together in their own way regardless of whether they had disabilities, nationalities, or cultures.

The players entered in the order in which the country names were written in English, and Afghanistan entered first. South Korea was the 16th country to enter between Kazakhstan and Kuwait under the name 'Korea'.

Athletics Min-ho Jang (Anyang City Hall, Sports Grade T13) and table tennis Ji-yu Yoon (Seongnam City Hall, Class 3) took the lead holding the Taegeukgi together.

Jang Min-ho, who also competed in the previous Asian Games, stands on the Nagoya stage again, and Hangzhou women's singles gold medalist Yun Ji-yu attempts to win her second consecutive women's singles title.

The players, including those in wheelchairs, entered the stadium one by one and enjoyed the festival by taking pictures of the crowd with their cell phones and waving the Korean flag.

North Korea, which only sent a team to one event, table tennis, entered the event under the name 'DPR Korea' for the 8th time, and the host country, Japan, entered the event for the 45th and last time.

After all athletes entered, Organizing Committee Chairman Omura and APC Chairman Rashed encouraged the athletes with speeches. Afterwards, Emperor Naruhito officially declared the opening of the meeting.

The APC flag was carried by six Paralympic medalists, including track and field athlete Atsushi Yamamoto, nordic skier Shoko Ota, alpine skier Kuniko Obinata, wheelchair basketball Kyoko Tsukamoto, judo Satoshi Fujimoto, and cross-country skier Yoshihiro Nitta.

The athlete representative oath was taken by Tokito Oda, the men's singles wheelchair tennis gold medalist at the 2024 Paris Paralympic Games, and track and field athlete Kaede Maegawa.

Oda won all four major wheelchair tennis championships and the Paralympic singles, while Maegawa is a player and picture book author who participated in the Paralympic Games three times in a row.

The climax of the opening ceremony was the lighting of the torch. The torch relay was carried out by seven current and former Japanese athletes who participated in the Paralympic Games.

Starting with Japan Sports Agency Commissioner Junichi Kawai, who won five gold medals in swimming at the 1996 Atlanta Games, the torch was continued by swimmer Aira Kinoshita, former judo player Makoto Hirose, and wheelchair rugby player Yukinobu Ike.

Next, former wheelchair basketball player Katsumi Miyake, former track and field long jumper Maya Nakanishi, and alpine skier Momoka Muraoka emerged as the final runners.

As the three runners ignited the firewood and rice straw inside the cauldron, the flame slowly spread upward and illuminated the cauldron.

The cauldron was made by artisans and citizens together by collecting clay from Seto, Tokoname, and Sanshu, the pottery producing regions of Aichi Prefecture. To express the cycle of nature, it will be returned to dirt after the competition.

Korea will send a team of 357 athletes, including 214 athletes, to all 18 events in this competition and aim to win more than 21 gold medals and place 6th overall.

Park Jin-ho (Gangneung City Hall) will participate in the men's 10m air rifle shooting event (sport grade SH1) held at the Aichi Prefectural Shooting Range in Toyota City, Japan on the 19th, aiming for the first gold medal for the Korean team.