Wednesday, 31 December 2025
Wednesday, 31 December 2025
Australia’s Sydney ushered in 2026 with its world-famous New Year’s Eve fireworks under an enhanced police presence, weeks after a deadly attack at a Jewish event killed 15 people in the city.
The harbour spectacle featured 40,000 pyrotechnic effects stretched across seven km, lighting up buildings and barges along Sydney Harbour, including the iconic Harbour Bridge and Opera House.
Organisers held a minute’s silence at 11:00 pm local time (1200 GMT) to honour the victims of the 14 December attack.
During the tribute, the Harbour Bridge was lit in white and a menorah, a symbol long used to symbolise Judaism, was projected onto its pylons.
"After a tragic end to the year for our city, we hope that New Year’s Eve will provide an opportunity to come together and look with hope for a peaceful and happy 2026," Sydney’s Lord Mayor Clover Moore said ahead of the event.
The attack, in which a father and son gunmen are alleged to have killed 15 people at a Hanukkah event, was Australia’s worst mass shooting in almost three decades.
The incident shocked the nation and stoked fears of rising antisemitism.
In its aftermath, traditional Christmas celebrations at Bondi were muted this year, and several New Year events planned there were cancelled.
Security was visibly tightened for the celebrations, which typically draw more than a million revellers.
Around 3,000 police were deployed across the city, some carrying long arms.
"We have to show defiance in the face of this terrible crime and say that we're not going to be cowed by this kind of terrorism, and we're not going to change the way we live our life in our beautiful city," New South Wales Premier Chris Minns said on Wednesday.
In the Pacific, New Zealand was among the first countries to welcome the New Year, marked by a fireworks display in Auckland that illuminated the sky above the city’s Sky Tower.
The tower, a focal point of the skyline, served as the centrepiece of the celebrations, drawing locals and visitors to witness the first major countdown of the year.
The five-minute display included 3,500 fireworks launched from various floors of the 240-meter Sky Tower, the country’s tallest structure.
In New Zealand, the Chatham Islands ring in the new year the earliest.
Kiritimati Island in Kiribati, a country in the Pacific Ocean, was the first place in the world to welcome the New Year. The island, located in the UTC+14 time zone, is also known as Christmas Island.
