Revellers around the world rang in the New Year with the usual fireworks and fanfare accompanied by calls for peace from the United States and Iraqi presidents.
Hundreds of thousands crowded amid tight security into New York’s Times Square and paid special tribute to those who brought relief to the hurricane-devastated city of New Orleans.
Braving freezing temperatures and sleet, close to one million people crammed into the ”crossroads of the world” for the traditional centrepiece of New Year celebrations across the United States.
The square erupted in song, cheers and a cloud of confetti after the crowd counted down the last seconds of the year while watching the traditional crystal ball make its midnight descent to illuminate the giant numerals 2006.
In New Orleans itself, crowds gathered in the historic French Quarter to bid farewell to a tragic year in which more than 1 000 people were killed in the devastation of Hurricane Katrina.
The once-flooded city, known before the hurricane assault as a party town, marked the end of the year with traditional jazz funeral processions to remember the victims.
But people were also celebrating, drinking in the streets of the devastated city. Residents and police said a surprising number of tourists flocked to the French Quarter for a concert and fireworks over the Mississippi River.
Storms in California forced the cancellation of a street party in Los Angeles at which pop stars the Black Eyed Peas were to perform. In the San Francisco area, thousands of people were evacuated to shelters due to mudslides and floods.
Security was tight for festivities in major cities worldwide, with 25 000 police and paramilitary gendarmes on duty in France amid fears of a repeat of the urban violence seen in towns and cities nationwide last month.
However, despite the torching of about 320 cars nationwide, and 266 arrests, police reported no serious outbreaks of unrest, and 500 000 revellers welcomed the arrival of 2006 in Paris’s most famous avenue, the Champs-Elysees, according to police.
Street parties and glittering displays marked the festivities from Sydney to London, with crowds packing the banks of the River Thames to see the 10-minute blaze of fireworks focused on the London Eye, the city’s landmark ferris wheel, lit up in the colours of the five Olympic rings to celebrate London being awarded the 2012 Games.
The festivities also gave Londoners a chance to put the deadly July 7 terror attacks on the capital’s transport network in the past.
”We will not let our resolve slip to tackle the dangers we face, both at home, as so tragically illustrated on July 7, and abroad,” Prime Minister Tony Blair said in his New Year message.
Hundreds of thousands of people celebrated in sub-zero temperatures around Berlin’s Brandenburg Gate, while thousands braved the cold and the numerous police controls to see in the New Year in Moscow’s Red Square.
US President George Bush announced his resolutions for the year ahead of the celebrations there: to work for peace and prosperity and, in the short term, to watch a bit of American college football.
In Baghdad, Iraqi President Jalal Talabani said he hoped a new government of national unity would help improve public services and defeat the insurgency in 2006.
”Problems of lack of security, electricity and water persist and I hope they will be areas of priority for the new government, which we hope will be one of national unity,” Talabani said on Iraqi television.
In Israel, young people were determined to celebrate the New Year despite the disapproval of religious authorities who regard it as a Christian festival and a nationwide alert after a truce by Palestinian militant groups expired.
Israeli television and public radio reported 50 security alerts, about 10 of them concrete, about attacks being plotted by Palestinian armed groups to mark the holidays.
Two Palestinians were killed in the evening by Israeli fire in the northern Gaza Strip.
Flamboyant celebrating was not on the agenda in Lebanon, still living in the shadow of the latest assassination of an anti-Syrian political figure, the newspaper director Gibran Tueni.
Earlier in Sydney, 1 700 police patrolled the streets and beaches to prevent a possible repeat of suburban race riots there earlier this month.
Sydney’s landmark Opera House was illuminated at midnight by a spectacular pyrotechnical display.
Australia has 900 troops in Iraq and the government has warned repeatedly of militant attacks on home soil, but about one million people turned out in one of the first cities to leave 2005 and its violence behind.
In Beijing, bells and drums were sounded 108 times at midnight (4pm GMT) to mark an auspicious start to the year, signifying the elimination of worldly troubles in accordance with Buddhist tradition.
Authorities in Indonesia — already on high alert for possible attacks by Islamic extremists during the New Year period — fanned out in restive Central Sulawesi province after a bombing in a crowded market on Saturday left eight dead.
The festive mood across much of the region contrasted with last year, when prayer vigils and fundraising events replaced jubilant blow-out bashes in the wake of the devastating December 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami.
And in Africa, thousands of Kenyan prisoners decided to skip a meal on New Year’s day to save money to help millions facing severe food shortages.
In Johannesburg, police reported a fairly quiet New Year’s eve in Hillbrow, South African Broadcasting Corporation radio news reported on Sunday.
The Hillbrow community is notorious for flinging heavy objects like fridges out of high rise buildings while celebrating the New Year.
However, police still made 66 arrests during the night for assault, theft, drunken driving, rape and malicious damage to property.
In Cape Town the New Year was ushered in with fireworks and celebrations by thousands of people who flocked to the Waterfront. – Sapa