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 The announcement in Paris, which narrowly lost out to London in the
battle to host the 2012 Olympics, marks the start of a two-year
selection process where the world's most visited city will face off
against the likes of Rome for the right to play host.
"Paris 2024 promises a feasible and flexible Games concept," said
Denis Masseglia, head of the French National Olympic Committee
(CNOSF).
The International Olympic Committee (IOC) will announce the
candidate cities that made it to the shortlist in 2016, before the
vote of the host city in summer 2017.
Paris's Olympic plan, backed by the City Hall and French President
François Hollande, took some time to emerge.
Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo was reluctant about the potential cost but
endorsed the idea in March after study said the city's existing
infrastructures should help limit outlays, putting the hosting
budget at 6.2 billion euros ($6.97 billion).
"We aim to highlight the unity and the solidarity of a cosmopolitan
city, which I am sure will be one of the key strengths to win,"
Hidalgo said.
Hidalgo said one factor that changed her mind about hosting the
games was how millions of Parisians came onto the streets of the
French capital in a demonstration of unity to mourn victims of the
January attacks by Islamist gunmen on a satirical weekly and Jewish
foodstore.
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Paris will be competing for the 2024 honors with cities including
Boston, Hamburg and Rome,, which lost out to Paris in the bidding
contest when the French capital last got to host the games in 1924.
International Olympic Committee (IOC) president Thomas Bach told
President Francois Hollande last April, Paris would make a "very,
very strong candidate" for 2024.
(Reporting by Jessica Chen; editing by Brian Love and Mark John)
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