AP PHOTOS: New Year's Eve observances around the world

People around the world are welcoming 2018 with fireworks displays and loud cheering.

Revelers in Australia watched fireworks over Sydney Harbour. In North Korea, fireworks exploded over the Taedong River.

Elsewhere, the tone was more somber. In Turkey, some 100 people gathered outside Istanbul's Reina nightclub to remember the victims of a deadly New Year's attack a year ago. The group, holding carnations, observed a moment of silence. The attack happened early last Jan. 1, when an assailant shot his way into the nightclub, killing 39 people — most of them foreigners — and wounding 79.

In Scotland, a major windstorm caused some problems, but organizers expected Edinburgh's famed Hogmany New Year's Eve celebration to be unaffected.

In New York, revelers passed through security hours before the annual ball drop in Times Square.