PARIS, August 12. /TASS/. The 2024 Summer Olympic Games were closed late on Sunday night with an official ceremony at the over 81,330-seat capacity Stade de France Stadium in France.

Mayor of the city of Los Angeles Karen Bass received the Olympic flag at the end of the official closing ceremony because the United States is set to host the 2028 Summer Olympics.

The 2024 Summer Olympic Games were hosted by the French capital of Paris between July 26 and August 11.

Team USA finished the 2024 Summer Olympic Games in the top of the medal standings having packed 126 medals (40 gold, 44 silver and 42 bronze), leaving in 2nd place China with 91 medals (40 gold, 27 silver and 24 bronze) and Japan with 45 medals (20 gold, 12 silver and 13 bronze).

"Despite all the tensions in our world, you came here from all the 206 National Olympic Committees and the IOC Refugee Olympic Team, to make the City of Light shine brighter than ever before," President of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) Thomas Bach said during the closing ceremony adding that "The Olympic Games Paris 2024 were Olympic Games of a new era."

"That is why I would like to thank all our French friends," the IOC head continued. "First and foremost, my warmest thanks go to the President of the Republic, Emmanuel Macron, for his tireless support."

"My heartfelt thanks goes to the Organizing Committee, under the excellent leadership of my fellow Olympian, Tony Estanguet, for making these Games wide open."

"Dear French friends, you have fallen in love with the Olympic Games. And we have fallen in love with all of you," Thomas Bach said. "Thank you Paris, thank you France!"

During the closing ceremony of the 2024 Games in Paris, Hollywood star Tom Cruise rappelled down from the roof of the Stade de France Stadium to take the flag of the Olympic Games. The 62-year-old actor performed a stunt and then descended on a rope to the floor to take the flag to the United States.

The audience at the closing ceremony was also treated to videos provided by rock band Red Hot Chilli Pepers, pop-singer Billie Eilish and rap-singer Snoop Dogg.

The International Olympic Committee (IOC) allowed a team of 15 Russian athletes to participate in the 2024 Summer Olympics as neutrals.

The Russian team’s lineup included tennis players Daniil Medvedev, Pavel Kotov, Roman Safiullin, Yekaterina Alexandrova, Mirra Andreeva, Diana Shnider, Yelena Vesnina; canoeists Zakhar Petrov, Alexey Korovashkov, Olesya Romasenko; swimmer Yevgeny Somov; cyclists Tamara Dronova, Alyona Ivanchenko, Gleb Syritsa; and Anzhela Bladtseva, who competes in trampoline event.

IOC’s regulations against Russia

The International Olympic Committee (IOC) Executive Board convened for a meeting at the Olympic House in Lausanne, Switzerland, on March 19-20 and following the opening day it decided to bar athletes from Russia and Belarus from taking part in the Parade of Athletes and also exclude them from the 2024 Olympics overall medal standings.

The IOC, however, ruled that Russian athletes, cleared to participate in the 2024 Olympics, would not have to sign anything denouncing their country’s special military operation in Ukraine.

On October 12, 2023, the IOC suspended the Russian Olympic Committee (ROC) until further notice after the Russian organization included the Olympic councils of the Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics (DPR and LPR), the Zaporozhye and Kherson Regions as its members.

The Swiss-based CAS registered on November 6, 2023 an appeal from the ROC against the IOC’s decision on the Russian governing Olympic body’s suspension.

The suspension meant that the ROC cannot act as a national Olympic committee or receive financing from the Olympic movement. The IOC however reserved the right to clear Russian athletes to take part in the Olympic Games in Paris in 2024 as neutrals. Later, IOC President Thomas Bach said that Russian athletes should have no affiliation with the ROC if they want to compete at the Olympic Games.