STORY: :: Paralympic flame relay stops at a ceremony in Paris marking
80 years since the city’s liberation from Nazis during WWII
:: Paris, France
:: August 25, 2024
:: Emmanuel Macron, French President:
“Paris was broken, but not entirely. Because since June 18, 1940, many Parisians, hidden in cellars or sealed in their living rooms, keep their ears glued to the TSF to hear on the airwaves of Radio London, despite the jamming from the Germans, the great voice of Free France…
“Eighty years later, in our summer of flame and joy, this summer, marked by the funereal echoes of the war in Europe, this summer where, for other reasons, attention is turned towards Paris, capital of the universal and of Olympism, and of the Paralympic Games in a few days. We remember those who came before us.”
On the morning of August 25, 1944, General Philippe François Marie Leclerc’s tanks entered Paris from the south and west, and at noon, the French flag flew on the Eiffel Tower in place of a swastika, for the first time in four years.
The relay of the Olympic flame, ahead of the start of the Paralympic Games in Paris on August 28, made a stop at the anniversary ceremony as a tribute, before continuing on its journey in the Paris region.