In Pictures: COVID mutes New Year’s Eve as world ushers in 2021
1″ January “2021 ” Aljazeera
This New Year’s Eve is being celebrated like no other, with many people bidding farewell to a year they’d rather forget.
This New Year’s Eve is being celebrated like no other in most of the world, with coronavirus pandemic restrictions limiting crowds and many people bidding farewell to a year they would prefer to forget.
New Year’s experiences varied greatly depending on the country, just like the coronavirus itself.
Some big cities cancelled or scaled back their traditional celebrations, while a handful of places without active outbreaks carried on like any other year.
A, security guard stands on duty as a phoenix is shown on a giant screen on New Year’s Eve in Beijing, China. [Ng Han Guan/AP Photo]
One million people usually crowd Sydney Harbour, Australia to watch the annual fireworks, but this year authorities advised revellers to watch the fireworks on television in an attempt to curb new COVID-19 outbreaks. [Mark Baker/AP Photo
couple poses in front of illuminated 2021 sign in central Athens, which is normally packed on New Years’ Eve [Louisa Gouliamaki/AFP]
woman leaps as she has her photo taken on an empty street near Hotel Indonesia Roundabout which is normally crowded with people on New Year’s Eve, in Jakarta, Indonesia. [Dita Alangkara/AP Photo]
Fireworks detonate from the Taipei 101 building during the New Year’s celebrations in Taipei, Taiwan. [Chiang Ying-ying/AP PhotoPeople watch New Zealand band The Black Seeds perform during New Year’s Eve celebrations at Hagley Park in Christchurch, New Zealand. The country and its south Pacific island neighbours currently have no cases of COVID-19, and New Year celebrations there are the same as ever [Ernest Kung/AP PhotoFireworks explode behind the towers of the Kremlin during New Year’s Day celebrations in Moscow, Russia, where public events have been banned in other regions [Evgenia Novozhenina/ReutersPeople hold candles to welcome the new year in Lahore, PakistanPeople watch the flag raising ceremony and fireworks at Kim Il Sung Square in Pyongyang, North Korea. [Jon Chol Jin/AP]Many South Africans have swapped firecrackers for candles to mark New Year’s Eve amid COVID-19 restrictions including a nighttime curfew responding to President Cyril Ramaphosa’s call to light a candle to honour those who have died in the pandemic and the health workers who are on the frontline of battling the disease. [Denis Farrell/AP]A man runs in front of the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin, Germany. Due to coronavirus restrictions the annual New Year’s Eve celebrations at the Brandenburg Gate with hundreds of thousands guests won’t take place this year. [Michael Sohn/AP]
