In Sydney, the self-proclaimed "New Year's capital of the world", more than a million partygoers are expected to pack the city's foreshore, despite uncharacteristically dank weather. Eight tonnes of fireworks will light the fuse on 2024, a year that will bring elections concerning half the world's population and a summer Olympiad celebrated in Paris. The last 12 months brought "Barbiegeddon" at the box office, a proliferation of human-seeming artificial intelligence tools and a world-first whole-eye transplant. Perhaps more than anything, 2023 will be remembered for Hamas's October 7 assault on southern Israel -- and Israel's ferocious reprisals. - To the polls -Russia's is just one of several pivotal elections scheduled, with 2024 looming as the year of the ballots.

Source: Bangladesh Sangbad Sangstha December 31, 2023 05:02 UTC