During the Parade of Nations at the opening ceremony of the 2020 Summer Paralympic Games, athletes from each participating country paraded in the Japan National Stadium, preceded by its flag and placard carrier. Each flag bearer had been chosen either by the nation's National Paralympic Committee (NPC) or by the athletes themselves.
The International Paralympic Committee, in accordance with the agreement signed with the International Olympic Committee in June 2001, follows the same rules as the protocol manuals issued by the Organizing Committees of each edition of the Olympic and Paralympic Games since the 2002 Winter Olympic and Paralympic Games.In this way, the order in which delegations enter the opening ceremony of the Paralympic Games does not follow the tradition of Greece being the first country to enter, as it is not the historical birthplace of the Paralympic Games. However, the rule of a couple being flag bearers for each participating National Olympic Committee was extended to the Paralympic Games and for the first time ever, each NPC was invited to appoint one female and one male athlete to jointly carry their flag during the Opening Ceremony.
Incidents
Fall of Kabul
Under the assumption that Afghanistan's athletes would be unable to compete in the Paralympics due to the Fall of Kabul to the Taliban, the International Paralympic Committee invited the Office of the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) to represent Afghanistan in the Parade of Nations as a "sign of solidarity". However, the UNHCR declined to name a representative and a volunteer served as Afghanistan's flagbearer. The two athletes, Zakia Khudadadi and Hossain Rasouli, were evacuated from Afghanistan two days after the opening ceremony and later confirmed their participation in the Paralympics via a flight from Australia. The two carried Afghanistan's flag at the closing ceremony.
Non Participating Countries
New Zealand's and Brazil athletes also did not participate in the parade.
Salomon Islands withdrawn
Solomon Islands had its national flag paraded at the opening ceremony, but ultimately the Solomon Islands team withdrew from the 2020 Summer Paralympics due logistics issues.
Order of Parade
This was the first edition in which the new protocols approved at the 138th Session of the International Olympic Committee held days before the ceremony were used officially.Some rules were maintained from previous procedures, such as the obligation for the Refugee Paralympic Team delegation to be the first to enter during the Parade of Nations and the maintenance of the entry of other delegations in the alphabetical order of the host country were maintained as the same entering as the last team. Another change was the positioning of the teams whose countries will be the future hosts of the next Summer Paralympic Games, which entered the reverse sequence.According to the original planning, the United States would be the 5th delegation to enter placed between Afghanistan and United Arab Emirates delegations, but as the 2028 Summer Paralympics are scheduled to be held in Los Angeles they were placed as 160th delegation. This situation also happened with France which according to the protocol manual would be the 119th delegation, positioned between Brazil and Bulgaria, but due to the fact that Paris will be the host city of 2024 Summer Paralympics who entered as the 161st delegation and finally the host nation Japan.
As these protocol rules were approved before Brisbane was announced as the 2032 Summer Paralympics host, Australia was not allocated to enter before the United States team entered in its natural position in the Japanese language order between El Salvador and Austria. All other teams entered in between in Gojūon order, based on the names of countries in Japanese. The names of the teams were announced in English, and Japanese, the official languages of the Paralympic movement and the host nation, in accordance with Olympic Charter and International Olympic Committee (IOC) and International Paralympic Committee (IPC) guidelines.
The Republic of North Macedonia had previously competed under the provisional name of Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, because of the disputed status of its official name. It was officially renamed to North Macedonia in February 2019 and the National Paralympic Committee of North Macedonia (NMPC) was officially adopted in February 2020. It was North Macedonia's first appearance at the Summer Paralympics under its new name.
Several of the nations marched under their formal Japanese names. For example, the Great Britain delegation marched under the formal name Eikoku ("United Kingdom") rather than the better known informal Igirisu (イギリス), and China's delegation marched under Chūka Jinmin Kyōwakoku ("People's Republic of China") instead of the more common Chūgoku (中国).
Reviews
The names of each para-athlete who participated in the Opening Ceremony's Parade were projected and scrolled on the "digital signage" equivalent to the inner diameter of the stadium.