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Asiad gold medalist to kindle Pakistan's 31st National Games torch

(Xinhua)
Updated: 2010-12-07 20:48

PESHAWAR, Pakistan -- Pakistan's top squash player Aamir Atlas, the gold medal winner for Pakistan in the Guangzhou Asian Games, will kindle the torch of the 31st National Games scheduled from December 25 to 31, Pakistan's Olympic Association sources said.

The country's former legendary Olympians will line up in a row as a sign of efforts to promote sports during the opening ceremony to be inaugurated in Peshawar by Pakistani Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gillani on December 25.

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This was decided in a meeting of the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Olympic Association chaired by Provincial Sports Minister Syed Aqil Shah who is also the president of the association.

For the over-all monitoring of arrangements as well as games, a monitoring team was constituted to monitor security measures and training being imparted to players in various games at the camps.

The games event was earlier delayed due to bad security situation in the host province Khyber Pakhtunkhwa but now all four provinces, Islamabad, Army, Pakistan Air Force (PAF), Water Wapda, Railways and Higher Education Commission (HEC) promised their participation in the games.

The association assured that fool-proof security arrangements would be made, with a police control room established in the stadium while Chief Minister Ameer Haider Khan Hoti would himself monitor the security arrangements.

The association also decided to include three men sports wushu, hockey and football which were earlier excluded from the games.

With the inclusion, a total of 21 men sports and seven women sports would be played.