People around the world are saying goodbye to the unprecedented year of 2020 and entering the New Year, but celebrations are looking starkly different to previous years as COVID-19 continues to ravage around the world.
No light show illuminated Beijing from the top of the TV tower. St Peter's in Rome was nearly empty for vespers. London's Trafalgar Square, Moscow's Red Square, Madrid's Puerta del Sol and New York's Times Square were all barricaded off.
For decades, tens of thousands of revellers have filled the blocks around Times Square on New Year's Eve, standing for hours in the cold waiting to see the crystal ball glide down a pole mounted atop a skyscraper in the year's final seconds.
However to mark the end of 2020, only a handful of invited guests, including nurses, doctors, a grocery store worker and a pizza delivery man, will gather in New York's Times Square with their families, kept 2 metres apart in socially distanced pens.
"It's going to be actually, arguably, the most special, the most poignant, the most moving New Year's Eve," said mayor Bill de Blasio, who will push the button to start the crystal's ball descent. "In 2021, we're going to show people what it looks like to recover, to come back."
Australia welcomed 2021 with subdued celebrations with hopes for a better year dampened by new COVID-19 outbreaks in New South Wales and Victoria.
Hundreds of families spent New Year's Eve stranded in traffic jams as they rushed to cross state borders to avoid restrictions that kicked in from midnight.
Fireworks soared into the sky above the Sydney Opera House, but the harbour below was a deserted ghost town with outdoor gatherings limited to 30.
"What a hell of a year it's been," said New South Wales' premier Gladys Berejiklian. "Hopefully 2021 will be easier on all of us."
Large crowds took to the streets at midnight in the central Chinese city of Wuhan, celebrating the arrival of 2021 after a year marred by a deadly pandemic.
As per tradition, hundreds gathered in front of the old Hankow Customs House building, one of the city's more popular New Year's Eve spots. When the building's old clock reached midnight many people released balloons into the air, cheered and called out "Happy New Year".
The virus did not stop North Korea from staging its celebration in Pyongyang. State media showed revellers in face masks filling the main square for a concert and fireworks.
But in Madrid's Puerta del Sol, where Spaniards typically count down to midnight by stuffing grapes into their mouths at each clock strike, police put up barriers to keep people out.
Jose Angel Balsa, a 61-year-old retiree, said he would spend the evening "with family, just the four of us at home, holding lots of video calls and hoping for this to end as soon as possible."
In Britain, under ever tighter restrictions to fight a new, more contagious variant of the virus, official billboards instruct the public to "see in the New Year safely at home".
Italy's bars and restaurants were closed, and a curfew imposed for 10pm.
The rules prevented the traditional assembly of thousands of Roman Catholic worshippers for New Year's Eve vespers at St Peter's Basilica. Pope Francis cancelled plans to lead the service because of a flare-up of his sciatica, the Vatican said, and a cardinal read the pope's sermon to a small congregation at a secondary altar.
At "A la Ville de Rodez", an upmarket delicatessen in Paris, manager Brice Tapon sent customers home with packages of foie gras, truffles and pate for groups of two or three. Rules forbid more than six adults to gather around the dinner table.
One of the customers, Anne Chaplin, said she would "stuff myself with foie gras, champagne and all this food."
"And I'll stay home."
Reuters/Newshub
