Li Binghua, vice president of the Beijing Organizing Committee of the Games, carries the lantern encasing the Olympic flame, walks off a plane at Tokyo's Haneda Airport 6:05 a.m. local time, April 25. The Nagano leg of the Beijing Olympic torch relay is due to begin on Saturday. [Xinhua]

TOKYO -- The chartered plane carrying the Beijing Olympic sacred flame landed at Tokyo's Haneda Airport 6:05 a.m. local time Friday morning from Canberra for its 16th leg of torch relay scheduled for Saturday in the central Japanese city of Nagano.

The flame was carried off the plane in a lantern at 6:10 a.m. local time by Li Binghua, vice president of the Beijing Organizing Committee of Olympic Games (BOCOG).

The Beijing Olympic Flame Delegation, headed by Li, received warm welcome on the parking apron by about 100 people.