Australia has welcomed 2017 with a massive fireworks display at Sydney Harbour.
Some 1.5 million people had been expected to turn out on the waterfront.
Earlier, New Zealand’s Auckland has become the first major world city to welcome the New Year.
Many cities around the world have stepped up security for New Year’s Eve celebrations, after a year in which attackers drove trucks into crowds in Berlin in Germany and Nice, France.
Thousands of extra police will be on duty across major European cities and in the US.
Image source Flickr
In Madrid, Paris and New York, concrete barriers and heavy goods vehicles will be used to block off central squares where crowds gather to celebrate.
The midnight fireworks display at Sydney Harbour paid tribute to Prince and David Bowie, two music superstars who died in 2016.
Pacific islands including Samoa, Tonga and Kiribati entered 2017 at 10:00 GMT, followed an hour later by Auckland, where fireworks erupted from the 1,080ft tall Sky Tower in the city center.
Meanwhile, a “leap second” will be added to the countdown to compensate for a slowdown in the Earth’s rotation.
The extra second will occur as clocks strike midnight and a time of 23:59:60 GMT will be recorded, delaying 2017 momentarily. This is required because standard time lags behind atomic clocks.
Six people have been arrested in Brussels in connection with an alleged plot to target the Belgian capital on New Year’s Eve, prosecutors say.
The arrests come as cities around the world heighten security measures ahead of large-scale New Year celebrations.
The arrests in Brussels were made during raids in suburbs including Molenbeek, which was used as a base by the November 13 Paris attackers.
Brussels’ main fireworks display has been cancelled over the feared plot.
Photo AP
None of the six people arrested on December 31 have been identified. Two people arrested in Brussels earlier this week, named as 30-year-old Said S and 27-year-old Mohammed K, have been charged with threatening to carry out a terrorist attack.
According to Brussels police, the apparent plots to target New Year celebrations are not related to the network behind the Paris attacks.
Security is being stepped up in major European cities ahead of New Year celebrations, with officials wary of possible terror plots.
New Year fireworks and festivities have been cancelled in Brussels and extra measures are being put in place in other cities, including Paris, London, Berlin and Moscow.
Meanwhile in Turkey, security services say they have thwarted a major plot to attack celebrations in Ankara.
A 7 magnitude earthquake hit eastern and northeastern Japan today, but there are no immediate reports of injuries or damage and no danger of a tsunami.
The earthquake struck 217 miles below the sea surface at 2:28 p.m. (5:27 a.m. GMT) and measured 4 in central Tokyo, Fukushima and their surrounding areas,
Such a deep jolt is less likely to cause damage than one close to the surface.
The quake was centered near Japan’s Izu Islands, about 307 miles south-southwest of the capital, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.
Buildings swayed in Tokyo, but did not disrupt the final of the Emperor’s Cup football tournament being played at the National Stadium.
A spokesman for Tokyo Electric Power said there were no reports of any irregularities at the tsunami-crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plan.
Some roads were temporarily closed and high-speed train services in northern Japan were suspended for a short time.
The Hawaii-based US Pacific Tsunami Warning Centre has not issued a tsunami.
John Roos, the U.S. ambassador to Japan, said in a message on Twitter: “Memorable start to New Year – about to greet Emperor and Empress for New Year when Imperial Palace began to shake.”
Japan, which lies along the Pacific “Ring of Fire”, is one of the world’s most seismically active countries.
The country accounts for about 20% of the world’s earthquakes of magnitude 6 or greater.
On March 2011, the northeast coast was struck by a record magnitude 9 earthquake, and a massive tsunami, which triggered the world’s worst nuclear crisis in 25 years since Chernobyl.
The disaster left more than 20,000 dead or missing.
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