London has been accepted as an official candidate city for the 2012 Olympics and Paralympics after the shortlist of rivals was reduced from nine to five.
The International Olympic Committee chose London, Paris, New York, Madrid and Moscow to go forward to the final vote next year.
Rio de Janeiro, Istanbul, Leipzig and Havana failed to survive the cut.
The candidate cities must now submit more detailed plans to the IOC ahead of the decision in Singapore in July 2005.
The IOC's evaluation commission will visit all five cities for an inspection in February and March next year, with the possibility of a further cut before the final vote.
"After the evaluation report the IOC will study their findings in May before making a final proposal for the July session," said IOC president Jacques Rogge at the announcement in Lausanne.
The five rivals are now free to incorporate the Olympic rings in their bid logos and begin promoting their cause more intensively.
Paris, which hosted the Games in 1900 and 1924, is currently seen as the favourite, just ahead of London.
France staged the football World Cup in 1998, and the World Athletics Championships in Paris last year were hailed as a success. Paris has almost half its planned Olympic facilities already in place and the bid centres around established venues like the Stade de France, the Parc des Princes and Roland Garros.
The French capital has also moved the site of its proposed Olympic village, having failed with a bid for the 2008 Games, to make it closer to the city centre.
London is bidding to host the Games for the third time. It staged the event in 1908 and in 1948, when it stepped in after the Second World War.
It can make a powerful case for an Olympic legacy as the bid will involve the regeneration of a huge swathe of land in the east of the city around Stratford.
And London's bid team hopes to overcome doubts about transport problems by using the Channel Tunnel rail link to whisk spectators from King's Cross Station and north Kent to the Olympic zone.
New York, which has never hosted the Games before, is the only non-European city to make the cut.
The 2012 Games are believed to have a stronger chance of coming to Europe than North America as the 2010 Winter Olympics will be staged in Vancouver.
Madrid has promised an environmentally-friendly Olympics, but could be hampered by the fact that Spain staged the Games in Barcelona in 1992.
Rio was axed despite being tipped as an outside bet to win the Games, while Moscow was seen as one of the cities at risk of missing the cut.
The nine cities were judged on the 50-page detailed questionnaire they submitted in January.
BBC sports news correspondent Gordon Farquhar said the IOC report in Lausanne expressed a lower level of confidence in the Russian capital than in its four rivals.
London was marked better than New York, but behind Paris and Madrid, for transport.
It was given a strong rating for security and finance and a weak one for public opinion.
The former East German city of Leipzig had always been expected to struggle in a battle against more high-profile rivals.
Turkey will now set their sights on the 2016 Games after seeing Istanbul miss out for the fourth time in a row.
Havana's bid had been seen as the least likely to succeed due to the Cuban capital's lack of infrastructure and inadequate accommodation.
IOC president Jacques Rogge said: "This is not an indication that we don't trust these countries.
"It's just that the bids of these places in these countries were not considered to be good enough."
Source - BBC Sport
The International Olympic Committee chose London, Paris, New York, Madrid and Moscow to go forward to the final vote next year.
Rio de Janeiro, Istanbul, Leipzig and Havana failed to survive the cut.
The candidate cities must now submit more detailed plans to the IOC ahead of the decision in Singapore in July 2005.
The IOC's evaluation commission will visit all five cities for an inspection in February and March next year, with the possibility of a further cut before the final vote.
"After the evaluation report the IOC will study their findings in May before making a final proposal for the July session," said IOC president Jacques Rogge at the announcement in Lausanne.
The five rivals are now free to incorporate the Olympic rings in their bid logos and begin promoting their cause more intensively.
Paris, which hosted the Games in 1900 and 1924, is currently seen as the favourite, just ahead of London.
France staged the football World Cup in 1998, and the World Athletics Championships in Paris last year were hailed as a success. Paris has almost half its planned Olympic facilities already in place and the bid centres around established venues like the Stade de France, the Parc des Princes and Roland Garros.
The French capital has also moved the site of its proposed Olympic village, having failed with a bid for the 2008 Games, to make it closer to the city centre.
London is bidding to host the Games for the third time. It staged the event in 1908 and in 1948, when it stepped in after the Second World War.
It can make a powerful case for an Olympic legacy as the bid will involve the regeneration of a huge swathe of land in the east of the city around Stratford.
And London's bid team hopes to overcome doubts about transport problems by using the Channel Tunnel rail link to whisk spectators from King's Cross Station and north Kent to the Olympic zone.
New York, which has never hosted the Games before, is the only non-European city to make the cut.
The 2012 Games are believed to have a stronger chance of coming to Europe than North America as the 2010 Winter Olympics will be staged in Vancouver.
Madrid has promised an environmentally-friendly Olympics, but could be hampered by the fact that Spain staged the Games in Barcelona in 1992.
Rio was axed despite being tipped as an outside bet to win the Games, while Moscow was seen as one of the cities at risk of missing the cut.
The nine cities were judged on the 50-page detailed questionnaire they submitted in January.
BBC sports news correspondent Gordon Farquhar said the IOC report in Lausanne expressed a lower level of confidence in the Russian capital than in its four rivals.
London was marked better than New York, but behind Paris and Madrid, for transport.
It was given a strong rating for security and finance and a weak one for public opinion.
The former East German city of Leipzig had always been expected to struggle in a battle against more high-profile rivals.
Turkey will now set their sights on the 2016 Games after seeing Istanbul miss out for the fourth time in a row.
Havana's bid had been seen as the least likely to succeed due to the Cuban capital's lack of infrastructure and inadequate accommodation.
IOC president Jacques Rogge said: "This is not an indication that we don't trust these countries.
"It's just that the bids of these places in these countries were not considered to be good enough."
Source - BBC Sport