Paralympics close after 'historic summer'

Paralympic flame is extinguished before a concert featuring the best of French music

PARIS:

The Paralympics closed on Sunday with a giant music-fuelled party as chief Paris 2024 organiser Tony Estanguet said the Games and the Olympics had created a "historic summer".

The Paralympic flame and cauldron were extinguished before a concert featuring the best of French electronic music capped off proceedings at a packed Stade de France. More than 4,400 athletes from 168 Paralympic delegations partied despite persistent rain.

Estanguet said the closing ceremony marked the end of six weeks of Olympic and Paralympic fervour in the City of Light.

The former Olympic gold medal-winning canoeist said that period would remain "etched in people's memories".

"This summer, France had a date with history, and the country showed up," he said.

The next Paralympics will take place in Los Angeles in 2028.

In the official handover, Paris mayor Anne Hidalgo passed the Paralympic flag to International Paralympic Committee president Andrew Parsons, who gave it to Los Angeles mayor Karen Bass.

China finished top of the medals table in Paris, as they have at every Paralympics since Athens in 2004. They had 94 golds, followed by Britain with 49 and the USA with 36.

Ukraine's athletes overcame the formidable obstacles posed by their country's war with Russia to finish in seventh place with 22 golds and host nation France were eighth with 19 golds.

Broadway star Ali Stoker then sang the American national anthem before a film was shown of a band performing on a Californian beach as skateboarders and wheelchair athletes performed tricks.

Despite initial fears about ticket sales, the Paralympics took place in mainly full stadiums, benefiting from the feelgood factor from the highly successful Olympics which ended on August 11.

The hour-long electronic concert was kicked off by composer Victor Le Masne as LED bracelets worn by the crowd and athletes on the field lit up the stadium.