Tokyo Awarded 2020 Summer Games.

 

Tokyo was awarded the 2020 summer Games on Saturday (September 7), beating Istanbul in a head-to-head vote after Prime Minister Shinzo Abe had addressed the International Olympic Committee in person to allay fears over the crippled Fukushima nuclear plant.

The Japanese capital won the right to stage the sporting extravaganza for the second time, having hosted in 1964 when the Games first went to Asia, after two years of intense lobbying and tens of millions of dollars spent.

For Istanbul it was a fifth unsuccessful bid to host a summer Olympics.

Madrid, which had pitched a safe, affordable, "sensible" bid had been earlier eliminated first in a secret vote by International Olympic Committee members on a head to head with Istanbul after the two cities were tied in second place after the initial vote. Their attempt to host 2020 had been a third consecutive bid.

The next summer Olympics will be hosted by Rio de Janeiro in 2016.

List of host cities for the modern summer Olympics after Tokyo was awarded the 2020 Games on Saturday.

1896 - Athens

1900 - Paris

1904 - St Louis

1908 - London

1912 - Stockholm

1924 - Paris

1928 - Amsterdam

1932 - Los Angeles

1936 - Berlin

1948 - London

1952 - Helsinki

1956 - Melbourne

1960 - Rome

1964 - Tokyo

1968 - Mexico City

1972 - Munich

1976 - Montreal

1980 - Moscow

1984 - Los Angeles

1988 - Seoul

1992 - Barcelona

1996 - Atlanta

2000 - Sydney

2004 - Athens

2008 - Beijing

2012 - London

2016 - Rio de Janeiro

2020 - Tokyo