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`The 51st National Athletic Games, which is also meant to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the founding of the Korean Amateur Athletic Association, will be held for six days beginning October 6 at Seoul Stadium and 34 other sites in the capital city. The symbolic games fire will be lit at Mt. Mani on Kanghwa Island and for the purpose of fomenting a nationwide mood for the annual event this year, the torch will be carried through main cities of the country before being relayed finally to Seoul Stadium. The sports event is designed to contribute to the development of national culture by means of implanting fine sportsmanship in the minds of the entire people, not to speak of the athletes taking part in the games. It is also aimed at enhancing the nation`s physical strength which constitutes the prime source of national defense and production capabilities. Participating in the event are, besides the 16,000 athletes representing nine provinces, two main cities - Seoul and Pusan - and the Korean residents of Japan, approximately 20,000 persons, mostly students, who are to perform such programs as calisthenics, card-section displays and choruses. Especially noteworthy this year is the fact that athletes representing the people from the five provinces in north Korea, who fled to freedom in the south during the war, are to participate in the event for the first time. These athletes will compete for the honor and glory of the respective districts and people they represent, in a total of 28 games during the largest national sports event ever to be held. Games include, just to cite a few, tracks, tennis, baseball, basketball, soccer, Rugby football, boxing, wrestling, marksmanship, fencing, Taekwondo and swimming contests which were already held in the past summer. The Ministry of Communications is to issue three kinds of postage stamps in commemoration of the 51st Naional Athletic Games in the hope that the annual sports festival of the nation will increasingly contribute, as years go by, to the enhancement and promotion of our dignity and pride as a sports-loving nation.`