Olympic torch relay to visit Fukushima N-Plant host town

January 23, 2020

Fukushima--The Fukushima prefectural government decided Thursday to add a host town of the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant to the list of municipalities that the 2020 Tokyo Olympic torch relay will visit.

Torch bearers will run in the town of Futaba, one of the municipalities hosting Tokyo Electric Power Company Holding Inc.'s <9501> plant, the site of the 2011 nuclear disaster, on March 26, when the Japanese leg of the torch relay starts in the northeastern Japan prefecture.

On March 4, Japan will lift the evacuation order in part of Futaba that had been in place since the disaster. Torch runners will pass by Futaba Station on East Japan Railway Co.'s <9020> Joban Line, which will be fully reopened March 14.

Futaba is the only municipality where the evacuation order fully remains in place.

The inclusion of Futaba in the relay route is "apt" for the 2020 Games, dubbed as the Reconstruction Olympics, and "highly significant" for efforts to spread information on the current situation of Fukushima Prefecture to other parts of Japan and overseas, Fukushima Governor Masao Uchibori said. Jiji Press