The Olympic flame reached the top of Mount Everest today, an emotional moment for China and the crowning of the Beijing Olympics torch relay that was dogged by anti-Chinese protests on its world tour.
Climbers, all wearing red, shouted "Beijing welcomes you!" and "tashi delek" - a Tibetan greeting meaning "may everything be well" - after lighting the torch on the 8,848-metre peak at the end of a seven-hour climb with the Olympic flame protected in a lantern.
The Olympic torch is lit on the summit of Mount Everest in Tibet Photo: Xinhua News Agency
"Today's success is not just the success of the mountaineers, it is the success of the Chinese people," Hu Jiayan, deputy director of the General Administration of Sports, said. "I was deeply moved by the devotion of the climbing torch bearers but on their backs were standing millions of Chinese people."
Anti-Chinese protesters caused serious disruption to some legs of the main torch relay on its journey around the world after the deadly March 14th riots in the Tibetan capital of Lhasa and subsequent unrest in other Tibetan areas of China.
Three months to the day before the Games open, the first batch of climbers from a 31-strong team set out early this morning from a camp at 8,300 metres.
The climbers trudged slowly to the summit, in the final stages, staging a mini-relay. They unfurled the Chinese national flag, a flag with the five Olympic rings and a flag bearing the Beijing Olympic logo.
The climbing team, which included 22 Tibetans, eight Han Chinese and one man from the Tujia minority, had been on the mountain for more than a week preparing the route along the north-east ridge.
Two days of snow at the weekend destroyed some of the roped paths and camps but by yesterday, the penultimate camp at 7,790 metres was renovated and the climbers, also including three women, braced for the final push.
The Beijing organizers paused the main torch relay, scheduled to pass through the southern city of Shenzhen today while the final push for the summit was taking place.
The Everest flame will be reunited with the main flame later in the relay, possibly when it passes through Lhasa in mid-June.