US-NEW YEAR-CELEBRATIONS

Revelers gather in Times Square on New Year's Eve as people wait to ring in the year 2007 by watching the famous ball drop from the flagpole atop One Times Square in New York, 31 December 2006. A vast crowd was expected in Times Square in New York at the end of a tumultuous year for the US over the war in Iraq. AFP PHOTO / Timothy A. CLARY