Greece hands over Olympic Flame to Rio 2016 Summer Games organizers

The Flame burning for this summer's Rio Olympic Games was handed over to the Brazilian organizers in a spectacular ceremony held at Panathinaic Stadium in Athens on Wednesday.

At the marble venue of the first modern Olympics in 1896, Hellenic Olympic Committee President Spyros Capralos passed the Sacred Flame to the President of the Rio 2016 Organizing Committee Carlos Nuzman, wishing best success to the XXXI Games.

Nuzman left the stadium with the Sacred Light under the warm applause of some 30,000 Greeks and foreign tourists who had flooded the site.

Greek President Prokopis Pavlopoulos, international Olympic movement representatives, and Olympic medalists were also among the crowd that welcomed warmly the Olympic Flame when it entered the stadium.

The Sacred Light was carried by the Greek silver medalist in high jumping in the 1996 Atlanta Games Niki Bakogiannis, after having crossed a large part of Greece (about 2,200 kilometers) over the past week.

It was one of the highlights of the traditional handover ceremony which opened with the children's choir of the National Olympic Academy of Greece supported by the Philharmonic Band of the City of Athens singing the Olympic, Greek and Brazilian national anthems.

Silver world rowing champion in 2014 and 2015 Katerina Nikolaidou who will compete in the Rio Games in August was the last torchbearer to carry the flame inside the stadium.

It was the end of the first leg of the Torch Relay on Greek soil, which had started on April 21 at ancient Olympia when the Sacred Light was ignited by the sun's rays during a ritual ceremony at the birthplace of the Olympics.

After Nikolaidou lit the cauldron inside the stadium, dozens of Greek actors and dancers playing the roles of Ancient Greek goddesses, priestesses and young men performed an emotional choreography signed by artistic director Artemis Ignatiou that was inspired by Greek mythology and depictions on ancient Greek urns, murals and statues.

As the rhythm of the Ancient Greek Lyra, the flute, bagpipe and horn pipe was replaced by the Brazilian traditional melodies dancers released doves as symbols of world peace.

At the end of the ritual ceremony Greek actress Katerina Lechou in the role of a High Priestess lit a torch that she handed over to Capralos who passed it to Nuzman.

"We are handing you over the Flame to carry it to your beautiful country. We are entrusting you with a part of our history, a part of our culture," Capralos had said earlier addressing the event.

"Conveying the feelings of the whole Olympic family in Greece, those of the members of HOC, of our athletes and of all Greeks as well, I would like to wish you our very best for a most successful organization of the XXXI Olympic Games," he stressed.

In his address Nuzman underlined that it was the first time in history that the Olympic Games will be held in South America symbolizing the Olympic movement's timeless values of excellence, friendship and respect.

"We understand our responsibility as guardians of the Olympic Flame. The size of the tasks ahead obliges us to move forward rather fast. August is approaching like a flash. When you arrive in Rio, our culture will host you with charm. There will be plenty of music, poetry, love, excitement," Nuzman said.

"Let's celebrate together. We have plenty of reasons to be happy. We are building a better future for the boys and girls of the planet. That is the future we have been dreaming of. Certainly the future we deserve," he concluded.

The second leg of the Relay across Brazil will pass through 329 cities and towns traveling 20,000 kilometers by road and 10,000 miles by air being carried by 12,000 torchbearers before reaching Maracana stadium on Aug. 5 for the opening ceremony of the Games.

Among the 430 torchbearers in Greece was a Syrian amputee athlete who carried the Flame inside a refugee camp in Athens on Tuesday bringing a special meaning to this year's relay and a message of solidarity and fraternity among peoples.

In the opening ceremony in Rio among the 207 groups of athletes on parade will be a group of refugee athletes.

Speaking to Xinhua after Wednesday's ceremony Ignatiou and Lechou wished that the Flame will convey to the world the message of the Olympic Truce and that wars will stop.

"The Olympic Flame marks the start of the Games. In antiquity this meant that the Olympic Truce was observed. My wish is that in the difficult times we are living today this message of the Olympic Truce will travel across the globe and will become reality," Ignatiou, the choreographer of the Lighting and Handover ritual ceremonies said.

"Today I felt hope. Seeing the Flame coming after its journey across Greece, as it prepares to continue to Brazil, I wished that the Olympic values will also travel with the Sacred Light, first of all the Olympic Truce, an ideal which today has a special significance. People are capable for the better and the worse. I would like to believe that we will do the best," Lechou told Xinhua.

As the Sacred Light's journey to Brazil started on Wednesday evening, inside Panathinaic stadium Greek and Brazilian artists joined their voices and through a dance and music show wished best success to Rio.