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| Tokyo offers to help Hiroshima, Nagasaki study Olympic bid |
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Saturday, October 17, 2009
TOKYO: Tokyo, which has lost its bid for the 2016 Summer Olympics, offered on Friday to help Hiroshima and Nagasaki pursue their hopes of hosting the 2020 Games.
The two Japanese cities, which were devastated by US atomic bombs in World War II and later rebuilt into modern cities, announced on Sunday they were considering a joint Olympic bid in tandem with their campaign to promote a nuclear-free world.
"It is quite welcoming that these two cities have stood up to go after the Olympics as a means of promoting peace," Tokyo governor Shintaro Ishihara told a news conference.
He said discussed the idea with Hiroshima mayor Tadatoshi Akiba, an advocate of nuclear disarmament who has called for the world to be free of atomic weapons by 2020.
"I told him that we will provide him with (bidding) know-how as much as he may want," Ishihara said. But the outspoken novelist-turned-politician did not rule out the possibility of Tokyo bidding for the 2020 Olympics itself.
"We must decide our position (about another bid) while I am in office," said Ishihara, whose third four-year term will end in 2011.
The IOC is due to announce the 2020 host city in 2013. Rome, Venice and Palermo are reportedly preparing a bid to host the 2020 Summer Olympics. Other cities including Cape Town, Durban, Dubai and Rabat have also been mentioned as possible candidates.
Meanwhile, Three cities have formally applied to host the 2018 Winter Olympics.
The International Olympic Committee says Munich, the French city of Annecy and the South Korean resort of Pyeongchang submitted their bids by Friday's deadline.
After an initial evaluation process, the IOC executive board will decide next June which cities to accept as official bid candidates.
The full IOC will select the 2018 host city at its session in Durban, South Africa, on July 6, 2011.
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ISSN 1563-9479 
