HELSINKI, Dec 4 - Berlin was on Saturday elected by the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) to host the 2009 IAAF World Championships in Athletics, beating Spanish city Valencia and Croatian rival Split.
The decision was reached during a weekend meeting of the IAAF Council in Helsinki.
``This was a very decisive victory by Berlin and demonstrates that the Council was convinced that we are taking our most important competition to the right place,’’ IAAF president Lamine Diack said in a statement.
Berlin, which lost bids to hold the world track and field championships in 1991 and 2005, has a budget of 49.8 million euros (66.7 million dollars) for the event that it will host in its recently refurbished Olympic Stadium, the IAAF said.