SYDNEY -- The world's premier sporting carnival drew to a close in an extravaganza of sight and sound Sunday as the Olympic host city prepared to party the night away to bid farewell to the last Summer Games of the 20th Century.

Thousands of athletes from 199 nations conga-trained and danced their way through the Olympic closing ceremony at Stadium Australia after competing for 16 days in more than 300 events before 6.7 million ticketed spectators and a global television audience of more than 4 billion.

The event capped the end of a largely successful Olympics and the beginning of its journey to the nation to which it owes its origin for the next Games in 2004.

"I now declare the Games of the 27th Olympiad in Sydney closed and, in accordance with our tradition, I call upon the youth of the world to assemble, four years from now, in Athens, Greece, birthplace of Olympism, to celebrate with us the Games of the 28th Olympiad," said International Olympic Committee President Juan Antonio Samaranch.

Samaranch, who is set to step down next year, went on the declare Sydney's Games the best ever, as he traditionally does after every Olympics, but did not do at Atlanta following a fatal bombing and organizational chaos.

"These are my last Games as president of the IOC. They could not have been better. Therefore, I am proud and happy to proclaim that you have presented to the world the best Olympic Games ever," Samaranch said.

Sydney impressed Samaranch so much that he awarded the people of Sydney the Olympic Cup for what he described as a "perfect" organization of the Games.

The Games drew to a close with the U.S. and Russia topping the medal table again, but China leapt ahead of France and Germany, while host nation Australia improved three places to finish fourth.

Japan ended the Games in 14th place with five gold medals, eight silver and five gold medals -- a vast improvement on its 23rd place at the Atlanta Olympics.

The Games were marked for the host nation by the performance of indigenous Aboriginal track star Cathy Freeman, whose win in the 400-meters final was the nation's first track gold for eight years, but more importantly was embraced as a symbol of hope for many Australians who desire reconciliation with the country's Aboriginal people.

For Japan, the greatest moments were the performances of two of the smallest athletes at the Games who became two of its greatest champions.

Naoko Takahashi won the women's marathon gold medal with a run that wowed the world, while four-time world judo champion Ryoko Tamura finally won gold after losses that left her with silver in Barcelona and Atlanta.

Sydney shrugged off corruption scandals dogging the IOC and controversies over ticketing and transport for the Games to put on a mostly smooth and optimistic Olympics.

The Games were marred by 35 doping cases in the leadup to or during the Games, and the failure of new testing procedures for the endurance drug EPO to produce a single positive result.

At the heart of Sunday night's festivities was the handover of the Olympic flag -- passed on since the Antwerp Games in 1920 -- from Sydney Lord Mayor Frank Sartor to the mayor of Athens, Dimitris Avramopoulos.

That was preceded by the "Entrance of the Flags of Nations," in which the Japanese flag was borne by Takahashi.

The extinguishing of the Olympic flame from the giant caldron above Stadium Australia, where it has burned since it was lit Sept. 15, was synchronized with the deafening roar of an Australian Air Force jet flying overhead.

Festivities began with the medal ceremony for the men's marathon.

The closing spectacular was described as a backyard barbecue with 100,000 invited guests.

It featured a bevy of home-grown singers, as well as Australian sports commentators and comedians Roy Slaven and H.G., Australian TV icons who have lampooned the Games every night throughout the past two weeks.

They declared that Sunday night: "We have a duty to show the world we can party like no other country on Earth."

But the 2000 Games will be remembered for sporting achievements, like those of Takahashi.

They will be remembered for Marion Jones' failure to become the first track and field athlete to win five gold medals, and her husband's exposure as having tested positive to the bodybuilder nandrolone four times this year.

It was the Olympics of Australian swimming sensation Ian Thorpe, the awesome Pie

ter van den Hoogenband and Inge de Bruin of the Netherlands, and Romanian gymnast Andreea Raducan being stripped of gold.

The Olympic spirit also found an hero in Equatorial Guinea's 100-meter freestyle battler Eric Moussambani.

The world was thrilled at Maurice Greene who confirmed he was the fastest man on the globe, 10,000-meter gold medalist Haile Gebrselassie, and 400-meter star Michael Johnson.

Samaranch also announced the induction of eight athletes to the IOC -- a move aimed at overcoming its image of privilege and to encourage a greater focus on athletes.