Sports diplomacy – Second “Relay around the world” (14 March 2023)

For the second year running, the Ministry for Europe and Foreign Affairs is organizing a “Relay around the world” with the Paris 2024 Games organizing committee. The relay will be held all day on Tuesday 14 March, 500 days before the start of the Paris 2024 Olympic Games.

For 24 hours, more than 120 French embassies and consulates worldwide will take turns to organize sporting events in conjunction with the French community, athletes and representatives of local sports movements. The aim of the event, in keeping with the Paris 2024 motto “Games Wide Open”, is to bring the Olympic and Paralympic Games to as many people as possible, including beyond our borders.

In Paris, Mme Catherine Colonna, Minister for Europe and Foreign Affairs, will symbolically hand the baton to Senegal, which is hosting the Youth Olympic Games in Dakar in 2026. Staff from the Ministry for Europe and Foreign Affairs, the Ministry of Sport and the Olympic and Paralympic Games and the Paris 2024 Olympic and Paralympic Games Organizing Committee will participate in the event by taking part in a running race starting at the Quai d’Orsay and finishing at the Ministry of Sport and the Olympic and Paralympic Games, on a route along the Seine echoing the Olympic and Paralympic Games opening ceremony, which will be held on 26 July 2024.