New Year eve : Global terror attacks have cast a pall over New Year celebrations but Sydney was Saturday set to defy the threats and ring in 2017 with a firework extravaganza on the glittering harbour.
2016 has seen repeated bloodshed, most recently a deadly truck attack at a Berlin Christmas market, a similar incident on Bastille Day in France that killed 86, and atrocities in Turkey and the Middle East.
But New South Wales state premier Mike Baird urged “business as usual” in Australia’s biggest city where 1.5 million people are expected to watch the midnight fireworks.
My encouragement to everyone is to enjoy New Year’s Eve … in the knowledge that police are doing everything they can to keep us safe,” Baird said.
Some 2,000 extra officers will be deployed following the arrest of a man for allegedly making threats against Sydney’s big show in an online blog.
There have been a number of other reported threats this holiday period, in Asia-Pacific and elsewhere.
In Melbourne, police foiled a “significant” Islamic State-inspired terror plot planned for Christmas Day targeting the city with explosives.
Indonesia also said it foiled plans by an Islamic State-linked group for a Christmas-time suicide bombing, and 52 died in the Philippines in bomb attacks blamed on Islamist militants over the holidays.
