Tsunekazu Takeda

Tokyo intends to bid for 2020 Summer Olympics, despite recently losing out to Rio de Janeiro in the race for the 2016 Games, governor Shintaro Ishihara said in an interview. Ishihara is set to leave office in 2011, a few months before the official bids are submitted, but is still expected to influence the city's decision. "Tokyo will apply for it once again. We have taken all the trouble to build up the momentum. Tokyo must apply for it," Ishihara said in an interview with the influential newspaper Asahi Shimbun, published on Saturday. Rio became the first South American country to win the right ... Read Full Story

Tokyo's governor says he wants to bid for the 2020 Summer Olympics — a month after Japan's capital lost out to Rio de Janeiro for the rights to host the 2016 games. Gov. Shintaro Ishihara told a group of reporters Monday he wants to give it another try. Rio won the vote by IOC members last month, beating bids from Tokyo, Madrid and Chicago for the 2016 Olympics. Tokyo metropolitan government officials said Ishihara was expressing a personal view, and that a decision for another bid would require approval by the city assembly. Hiroshima and Nagasaki have also announced plans to jointly seek to ... Read Full Story

Tokyo, which has lost a bid to host the 2016 Summer Olympics, offered on Friday to help Hiroshima and Nagasaki pursue their hopes of hosting the 2020 Games. The two 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 as part of their campaign for a nuclear-free world. "It is quite welcome 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 he had discussed the idea ... Read Full Story

A stunned Tokyo Saturday rallied to consider another shot at hosting the Summer Olympics after being eliminated early in the race to host the event in 2016. "It's disappointing and mortifying," Tokyo's governor Shintaro Ishihara told Japanese media in Copenhagen, where the International Olympic Committee chose Rio de Janeiro as the 2016 Games host city over Chicago, Madrid and Tokyo. When asked whether Tokyo would now bid for the 2020 Games, Ishihara replied that "it is a question which must be positively considered in consultation with the Tokyo citizens, the Japanese people and the Japanese Olympic Committee. "I heard everyone say Tokyo's presentation was ... Read Full Story

The 2016 Olympic Games could be one of the last for mankind warned Tokyo Governor Shintaro Ishihara on Wednesday because of the parlous state of the environment. Ishihara, who was celebrating his 77th birthday, is the president of the Tokyo bid to win the right to host the 2016 Games which will be voted on by the 100-plus International Olympic Committee (IOC) members here on Friday. Ishihara, who won won the prestigious Akutagawa Prize for the best young author for his novel 'Season of the Sun' before he had graduated from university in 1956, said that unless the world took note of what was ... Read Full Story