Nudist swimmers wearing Santa hats waded into the calm waters of southern France, while revelers danced in the streets of Thessaloniki, Greece.
Grills are set up along a street as men prepare souvlaki while celebrating the last day of the year, in the northern city of Thessaloniki, December 31, 2023. © Sakis Mitrolidis, AFP
Around 2 million people gathered on Rio de Janeiro’s Copacabana Beach in a light drizzle to watch 12 minutes of fireworks in one of the world’s most popular New Year’s Eve locations.
People celebrate as they watch traditional New Year’s fireworks from the water at Copacabana Beach in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, on January 1, 2024. © Tercio Teixeira, AFP
In Denmark, the popular Queen Margaret II, Europe’s longest-serving monarch, chose her New Year’s Eve speech to announce her upcoming abdication.
The 83-year-old monarch will resign in favor of her son, Crown Prince Frederick, after 52 years on the throne.
The past 12 months brought “Barbenheimer” to the box office, a proliferation of human-like artificial intelligence tools and the world’s first complete eye transplant.
India overtook China as the world’s most populous country and then became the first nation to land an unmanned spacecraft on the Moon’s south pole.
It was also the hottest year since records began in 1880, with a series of weather-induced disasters hitting around the world.
Fans said goodbye to “Queen of Rock ‘n’ Roll” Tina Turner, “Friends” actor Matthew Perry, Anglo-Irish singer-songwriter Shane MacGowan and master dystopian novelist Cormac McCarthy.
Reconstruction
The year 2023 will be remembered for war in the Middle East, after Hamas’ unprecedented October 7 incursions into southern Israel and Israel’s fierce retaliation in Gaza.
The United Nations estimates that nearly two million Gazans have been displaced since Israel’s siege began, or about 85 percent of the peacetime population.
With the once bustling neighborhoods of Gaza City reduced to rubble, there were few places left to ring in the new year and even fewer loved ones to celebrate with.
“It was a black year full of tragedies,” said Abed Akkawi, 37, who fled the city with his wife and three children to a UN shelter in Rafah, southern Gaza.
“God willing, this war will end, the new year will be better and we will be able to return to our homes and rebuild them, or even live in a tent among the rubble,” he told AFP.
In Tel Aviv, Israel, Ran Stahl, 24, preferred to work his shift at a wine bar on New Year’s Eve, saying he didn’t have the heart to celebrate.
“The moment I start dancing, the sadness and mourning come back,” said Stahl, whose friend was killed at the trance music festival during the Hamas attack on Oct. 7.
A woman watches the sunset amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas, in Jaffa, near Tel Aviv, Israel, December 31, 2023. © Clodagh Kilcoyne, Reuters
Some in Vladimir Putin’s Russia were also tired of the conflict, this time in Ukraine.
“In the new year I would like the war to end, a new president and normal life to return,” said Zoya Karpova, a 55-year-old theater decorator living in Moscow.
Young people take a photo in front of a Christmas tree during the New Year’s Eve celebration in front of the Saint Sophia Cathedral in kyiv, Ukraine, December 31, 2023. ©Valentyn Ogirenko, Reuters
But Putin himself remained optimistic in his New Year’s Eve speech, promising that Russia will “never back down.”
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s New Year’s Eve speech, after almost two years of war, was defiant.
Ukrainian pilots are mastering F-16 fighter jets supplied by their allies, he claimed. In 2024, “we will definitely see them in our skies. So that our enemies can see with certainty what our true anger is.
Russia would also feel the full force of Ukraine’s domestic weapons production, he added, including at least a million drones.
In Rome, Pope Francis prayed for victims of conflict around the world, including the people of Sudan and the “Rohingya martyrs” of Myanmar.
“At the end of a year, do we have the courage to ask how many lives have been destroyed in armed conflicts, how many deaths?” the 87-year-old pontiff said after praying the Angelus in St. Peter’s Square.
«And how much destruction, how much suffering, how much poverty? “Those who are interested in these conflicts, listen to the voice of conscience.”
to the polls
Several crucial elections are scheduled for 2024, in which the political fate of more than four billion people will be decided in contests that will shape Russia, Britain, the European Union, India, Indonesia, Mexico, South Africa, Venezuela and many other nations. .
But one election in particular promises global consequences.
In the United States, Democrat Joe Biden, 81, and Republican Donald Trump, 77, appear set for a November repeat of their divisive 2020 presidential race.
Biden rang in the new year by proclaiming optimism for the American economy and his well-known love of chocolate chip ice cream.
In a televised appearance before celebrations in New York, he highlighted his country’s resilience after the pandemic and announced that the American people “are back.”
As an incumbent, Biden has at times seemed to show his age, and even his supporters worry about the cost of another four painful years in office.
There are at least as many concerns about Trump’s return.
He faces trial on several charges, and the year 2024 could determine whether the bombastic self-proclaimed billionaire goes to the Oval Office or jail.
(FRANCE 24 with AFP)
2024-01-01 20:21:12
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