Prime Ministerial sports adviser Mehmet Atalay announced the city’s intention to bid yesterday in London at the Sports Event Management conference.
“We decided not to bid for 2016 while we concentrated on trying to make sure we had everything in place to launch a serious attempt for 2020,” Atalay said. “Like London we have the history, the culture and the organisational experience.”
Atalay said the Turkey government’s international sports department had travelled widely to understand the challenge of hosting a major sports event, and pointed to list of such events which had already been held in the country, including the 2005 Uefa Champions League final.
Other locations which have announced an interest in bidding to host the Games include Tokyo (with some events possibly staged in Hiroshima and Nagasaki), Rome, Venice, Cape Town, Johannesburg, Durban, and Qatar, possibly in association with Dubai.
