Home Australia Say hello to 2025! Tiny Pacific island becomes first country to welcome the New Year as the world prepares to celebrate

Say hello to 2025! Tiny Pacific island becomes first country to welcome the New Year as the world prepares to celebrate

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Say hello to 2025! Tiny Pacific island becomes first country to welcome the New Year as the world prepares to celebrate

A small island in the Pacific has welcomed the year 2025, while the rest of the world prepares to celebrate the beginning of a new year.

Christmas Island, officially known as Kiritimati, is home to more than 7,000 people and is the most advanced time zone in the world, making it the first to enter in 2025.

Tonga and New Zealand’s Chatham Islands will soon follow the island nation of Kiribati, while the first major cities to welcome the new year will be Auckland and Wellington at 1100 GMT.

Already, crowds have gathered there and in Australia to marvel at the fireworks and toast with champagne.

As 2024 draws to a close, the world says goodbye to a year that brought Olympic glory, a dramatic return of Donald Trump and turmoil in the Middle East and Ukraine.

2024 will almost certainly go down as the hottest year on record, with climate-induced disasters wreaking havoc from the plains of Europe to the Kathmandu Valley.

As New Year’s Eve festivities began along picturesque Sydney Harbor on Tuesday afternoon, many revelers were relieved to see the past 12 months in the rearview mirror.

‘Family fireworks’ light up Sydney Opera House and Bridge, three hours before main midnight show

Christmas Island, officially known as Kiritimati, is home to more than 7,000 people.

Christmas Island, officially known as Kiritimati, is home to more than 7,000 people.

“There is clearly a lot of war and unrest in a number of places,” Stuart Edwards, a 32-year-old insurance worker, told AFP as the first crowds gathered on Sydney’s waterfront.

“It would be good for the world if everything would take care of itself, take care of itself.”

The self-proclaimed “New Year capital of the world” will launch nine tonnes of fireworks from its famous Opera House and Harbor Bridge at midnight.

The ‘family fireworks’ have already illuminated the Sydney Opera House and Bridge as they do every year at 9pm local time, three hours before the main show.

More than a million spectators are expected to pack the city’s beach to catch a glimpse of the pyrotechnics.

“Just seeing all the beautiful colors and enjoying this situation with so many people in wonderful Australia,” said 71-year-old retired nurse Ruth Rowse.

In 2024, the Paris Olympics brought the world together for a few short weeks in July and August.

Athletes swam in the Seine, ran in the shadow of the Eiffel Tower and rode horses through the manicured gardens outside the Palace of Versailles.

Taylor Swift brought down the curtain on her Eras tour this year, pygmy hippo Moo Deng went viral and 16-year-old soccer prodigy Lamine Yamal helped Spain win the Euros.

It was a global election year, with countless millions of people going to the polls in more than 60 countries.

Vladimir Putin prevailed in a Russian election widely dismissed as a sham, while a student uprising in Bangladesh toppled the sitting prime minister.

However, no vote was watched as closely as the Nov. 5 race, in which Donald Trump will soon return to the White House.

From Mexico to the Middle East, Trump’s imminent return as commander in chief is already making waves.

Fireworks explode around the London Eye during New Year's celebrations in London last year.

Fireworks explode around the London Eye during New Year’s celebrations in London last year.

The president-elect has threatened to cause economic suffering for China and boasted of his ability to stop the Ukraine war in “24 hours.”

Turmoil spread across the Middle East as Bashar al-Assad fled Syria, Israel marched into southern Lebanon and rigged electronics exploded in a killing spree against Hezbollah.

Civilians grew tired of the grinding war in Gaza, where dwindling stocks of food, shelter and medicine made the humanitarian crisis even grimmer.

“The year 2024 was the most difficult year,” Wafaa Hajjaj told AFP from Deir el-Balah, where masses of displaced residents are now crowded into overcrowded tents.

“I have lost many loved ones, including my father and close friends, since the beginning of the year,” he said.

“May security return and may the war finally come to an end.”

There was hope and fear as the new year approached in Syria, which is still reeling after Islamist rebels toppled former ruler Assad.

“We hesitated to go out this year due to the security situation, but we decided to overcome our fears and not change our habits,” lawyer Maram Ayoub, 34, told AFP from the capital Damascus.

The Russian invasion of Ukraine is approaching its grim third anniversary in February.

Outgunned on its eastern flank, Ukraine must now confront a Trump administration apparently determined to withdraw crucial military aid.

On the streets of kyiv, Professor Kateryna Chemeryz wanted “peace to finally be achieved for Ukraine” and for “people to stop dying.”

With AI advances on the horizon and rampant inflation about to slow, there is still a lot to look forward to in 2025.

Britpop bad boys Oasis will make a long-awaited reunion, while K-pop megastars BTS return to the stage after military service in South Korea.

Soccer fans will enjoy a revamped 32-team Club World Cup in the United States.

And some 400 million pilgrims are expected at the spectacular Kumbh Mela festival on the sacred banks of India’s rivers, considered the largest gathering of humanity on the planet.

The UK’s weather service has already forecast sweltering global temperatures by 2025, suggesting it is likely to be among the hottest years on record.

But with electric vehicle sales surging and renewable energy on the rise, there is a glimmer of hope that glacial progress on climate change may finally gain momentum.

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