<P> Plans for moving the nation's capital city from Rio de Janeiro to the centre of Brazil had been occasionally discussed, and when Juscelino Kubitschek was elected president in 1955, it was partially on the strength of promises to build a new capital . Though many thought that it was just campaign rhetoric, Kubitschek managed to have Brasília and a new Federal District built, at great cost, by 1960 . On 21 April of that year the capital of Brazil was officially moved to Brasília . The territory of the former Federal District became its own state, Guanabara, after the bay that borders it to the east, encompassing just the city of Rio de Janeiro . After the 1964 coup d'état that installed a military dictatorship, the city - state was the only state left in Brazil to oppose the military . Then, in 1975, a presidential decree known as "The Fusion" removed the city's federative status and merged it with the State of Rio de Janeiro, with the city of Rio de Janeiro replacing Niterói as the state's capital, and establishing the Rio de Janeiro Metropolitan Region . </P> <P> In 1992, Rio hosted the Earth Summit, a United Nations conference to fight environmental degradation . Twenty years later, in 2012, the city hosted another conference on sustainable development, named United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development . The city hosted the World Youth Day in 2013, the second World Youth Day in South America and first in Brazil . In the sports field, Rio de Janeiro was the host of the 2007 Pan American Games and the 2014 FIFA World Cup Final . On 2 October 2009, the International Olympic Committee announced that Rio de Janeiro would host the 2016 Olympic Games and the 2016 Paralympic Games, beating competitors Chicago, Tokyo, and Madrid . The city became the first South American city to host the event and the second Latin American city (after Mexico City in 1968) to host the Games . </P> <P> Rio de Janeiro is on the far western part of a strip of Brazil's Atlantic coast (between a strait east to Ilha Grande, on the Costa Verde, and the Cabo Frio), close to the Tropic of Capricorn, where the shoreline is oriented east--west . Facing largely south, the city was founded on an inlet of this stretch of the coast, Guanabara Bay (Baía de Guanabara), and its entrance is marked by a point of land called Sugar Loaf (Pão de Açúcar)--a "calling card" of the city . </P> <P> The Centre (Centro), the core of Rio, lies on the plains of the western shore of Guanabara Bay . The greater portion of the city, commonly referred to as the North Zone (Zona Norte), extends to the northwest on plains composed of marine and continental sediments and on hills and several rocky mountains . The South Zone (Zona Sul) of the city, reaching the beaches fringing the open sea, is cut off from the Centre and from the North Zone by coastal mountains . These mountains and hills are offshoots of the Serra do Mar to the northwest, the ancient gneiss - granite mountain chain that forms the southern slopes of the Brazilian Highlands . The large West Zone (Zona Oeste), long cut off by the mountainous terrain, had been made more easily accessible to those on the South Zone by new roads and tunnels by the end of the 20th century . </P>

Rio de janeiro on map of south america