New Year’s Eve 2019 – live: Revellers descend on London to welcome new decade, as Sydney fireworks display prompts fury amid wildfires
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Your support makes all the difference.The world is set to mark the end of the year, and the decade, as 2019 comes to a close – and while spectacular firework displays are expected to herald in the 2020s across the globe, some threaten to be overshadowed by ongoing events.
In Australia, New Year’s Eve celebrations have been marred by wildfires which have threatened to cause mass evacuations in population hubs including Victoria in the east of the country.
Meanwhile Hong Kong has braced for fresh protests over Chinese influence in the region to interrupt festivities.
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Where we're going, we don't need roads
Tokyo has just celebrated New Year's - but a lucky few in the city who have decided to travel back in time won't have to wait a whole year for a secondary celebration.
Flight tracker service Flightradar has found a plane that departed shortly after midnight - and is due to land in Los Angeles in time for 2019.
China and Hong Kong set to celebrate New Year amid tension
Both China and Hong Kong are set to ring in the new year following a speech from Beijing's Xi Jinping urging calm in the semi-autonomous city state.
Hong Kong activists, who have protested against China's control in the region for much of the year, have maintained protests throughout the day - hoisting neon signs that read "free HK" while vowing to "persist" in 2020.
It comes after Xi Jinping called for a "harmonious and stable environment" in the region as part of his New Year's address.
He asaid: "The situation in Hong Kong has been everybody's concern over the past few months.
"Without a harmonious and stable environment, how can there be a home where people can live and work happily?
"We sincerely hope for the best for Hong Kong and Hong Kong compatriots."
A prosperous and stable Hong Kong is the aspiration of Hong Kong compatriots, as well as the expectation of the people of the motherland, he added
Hong Kong light display begins
The official live feed from Hong Kong – which will be lit up by a light show when midnight arrives in a couple of minutes – is here. Unlikely that will give much coverage to the expected protests... But it will be a spectacular light show.
Protests in Hong Kong continue
As the light show begins in Hong Kong, protests continue and activists report being sprayed with toxic liquid. (You can see the light show in the post below.)
Countries across Asia move into 2020
With the arrival of 4pm UK time, it's not just China and Hong Kong that have entered 2020. The timezone is the world's most populated, given it is shared right across China.
Countries across Asia and Australasia are now in the New Year: the eastern part of Mongolia, Brunei, Indonesia, part of Russia, Western Australia and many other cities and countries just switched over to the new year.
First of UK's straight civil partnerships celebrated on New Year's Eve
A heterosexual couple who were among the first to enter into a civil partnership have hailed the law change for young people who "don't have to go up the aisle if they don't want to".
Ann "Pee-Wee" Chamings and her partner John Eccles tied the knot in a civil ceremony on New Year's Eve, marking the first day such unions became a legal alternative for mixed-sex couples.
The East Sussex pair were among those who took the fight for opposite-sex civil partnerships to the Royal Courts of Justice in London, pushing for a change in the law.
Ms Chamings said the ceremony at Hastings Town Hall, witnessed by their two children, was "just ideal" for the couple, who first met in 1975 and have been together for 43 years.
"Absolutely happy that we managed to get to this point, it's not that I don't believe in marriage, I think marriage is fine for some people, but it has connotations of patriarchal and religious associations that really didn't suit us," she said.
Indonesian celebrations marred by torrential rains and threat of volcanic eruptions
Tens of thousands of revelers in Indonesia's capital of Jakarta were soaked by torrential rains as they waited for New Year's Eve fireworks. 2020 will arrive in Indonesia at 5pm UK time.
Festive events along coastal areas near the Sunda Strait were dampened by a possible larger eruption of Anak Krakatau, an island volcano that erupted last year just ahead of Christmas Day, triggering a tsunami that killed more than 430 people.
The country's volcanology agency has warned locals and tourists to stay 2 kilometers (1.3 miles) from the volcano's crater following an eruption Tuesday that blasted ash and debris up to 2,000 meters (6,560 feet) into the air.
Warren warns 'democracy hangs in the balance' in New Year's Eve speech
Democratic presidential contender Elizabeth Warren sought to reenergize her White House campaign in a New Year's Eve speech on Tuesday, warning that "democracy hangs in the balance" five weeks before nominating contests begin in early February.
In her home state of Massachusetts on the first anniversary of her campaign launch, Warren said President Donald Trump would "try to cheat his way through yet another election" if he is not removed from office after his impeachment by the Democratic-controlled U.S. House of Representatives.
"In the past 12 months, the president has become bolder with his lies and more brazen in his law-breaking," said Warren, who as a U.S. senator will vote on whether to convict Trump of improperly pressuring Ukraine for political favors. "Meanwhile, the Republicans in Congress have turned into fawning, spineless defenders of his crimes."
The race for the Democratic nomination remains fluid as the calendar turns to 2020, with 15 Democrats still in the running and a majority of voters telling pollsters that they have yet to settle on a final choice. The nominating contests in Iowa and New Hampshire in early February will be critical tests of candidates' viability.
Warren's address took place at a church in downtown Boston known as a gathering place for revolutionary colonists in the 1770s.
"We are a nation that fights back," she said. "Fighting back is an act of patriotism."
Warren remains a top Democratic candidate in national opinion polls but saw her standing slip since early autumn after a months-long surge that briefly vaulted her to front-runner status.
Hong Kong welcomes in the new year with unrest
Thousands of Hong Kong revellers welcomed in 2020 on neon-lit promenades along the picturesque Victoria Harbour, breaking into pro-democracy chants as the clocks struck midnight after more than half a year of often violent unrest.
Protesters briefly blocked Nathan Road, a key artery leading through Kowloon to the harbour, after forming human chains across the Chinese-ruled city and marching through shopping malls, urging people not to give up the fight for democracy in 2020.
The protesters fled when police came to clear the road of umbrellas, street furniture and debris and a three-metre-tall skeleton of a metal Christmas tree. Several arrests were made.
Authorities had cancelled the popular new year fireworks for the first time in a decade, citing security concerns. A "Symphony of Lights" took place instead, involving projections on the city's tallest skyscrapers after the countdown to midnight.
There were small-scale pyrotechnics on waterfront rooftops, but the grandiose fireworks launched from vessels in the centre of the harbour, broadcast around the world every year, were absent.
The carnival atmosphere on the harbour was interrupted as parts of the crowd of thousands watching the show began chanting protest slogans, such as "Liberate Hong Kong! Revolution of our times" and "Five demands, not one less."
The latter refers to the goals of the anti-government movement, which include universal suffrage and an independent inquiry into alleged police brutality.
The protesters are angry at what they see as creeping Beijing influence in the city which was guaranteed wide-ranging autonomy when it returned from British to Chinese rule in 1997. Beijing denies interference and blames the West for fomenting the unrest.
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