Tokyo Selected To Host 2020 Games

The city of Tokyo has won the race to host the 2020 Olympic and Paralympic Games, after seeing off competition from Turkey’s Istanbul and Spain’s Madrid. 

The Japanese capital will now host the event for the first time since 1964, becoming the first Asian city to host the Games twice, taking the baton from Rio after the Games travel to Brazil in 2016. 

Tokyo beat Istanbul in the final ballot by 60 votes to 36 after Madrid was earlier eliminated in the first-round. 

The winning city was announced by IOC president Jacques Rogge, who will retire on Tuesday after 12 years in the role.

The success of the Tokyo bid followed a personal address from the Japanese prime minister during the presentation stage, in which he allayed fears over the crippled Fukushima nuclear plant 150 miles (240km) from the city

The prime minister’s presentation also revealed the role sport had played in boosting the country in the past two years and pointed out that no Japanese athlete had failed a drugs test at an Olympics or Paralympics.

It added sponsorship would reach record levels and 10 new permanent sports venues would be constructed, including the Olympic Stadium, which will be finished by 2019 in time to host the Rugby World Cup.

For Istanbul, their campaign had not been able to overcome concerns about serious political unrest in the country, a series of doping scandals among the country’s athletes, the jailing of political opponents and journalists, plus the conflict in neighbouring Syria.

It was Istanbul’s fifth failed bid to host the Games and Madrid’s third consecutive rejection. 

Meanwhile, wrestling has been reinstated as an Olympic sport for the 2020 and 2024 Games after being voted in ahead of baseball/softball and squash.

International Olympic Committee (IOC) members conducted a secret electronic ballot on the issue in Buenos Aires.

Wrestling had been dropped from the 2020 Olympic programme in February after the IOC assessed the performance of all 26 sports at London 2012.