Denmark’s Prime Minister Helle Thorning-Schmidt asked the nation to be prepared for tougher times in her New Year speech at the weekend. Read the full story

The time is nearing for Iceland to celebrate the arrival of 2011 with copious food, fireworks and laughter courtesy of the Aramotaskaupid annual sketch show, which is watched by very nearly everybody in the country. Read the full story

It’s 2010 and much has changed since this time last year. Despite a good past year for many individuals, the collective experience of the Nordic people has been fairly low on the list of all-time highlights. Read the full story

It may still be nice to receive a Christmas card through the post – but these days the real king of holiday greetings is the mobile phone text message. Proof of this can be inferred from the fact that more than 50 million text messages were sent from Swedish phones during New Year’s Eve alone. That is more than five for every man, woman and child in the country. Read the full story

Readers of the website of the Danish national broadcaster dr.dk chose the New Year’s message from Fridrik Weisshappel the best of the 24 which were posted before Christmas. Weisshappel is an Icelandic entrepreneur in Denmark. Read the full story

Several people were injured by fireworks in Denmark, Sweden and Norway during the New Year festivities.

Around 500 young party-goers broke into a store in central Copenhagen when a New Year’s celebration got out of control. About 50 people were arrested as a bonfire was lit and stones thrown at the police.

The number of small fires during New Year’s celebrations was up from a year ago, according to Falck, a Danish rescue service company. The number of injuries caused by fireworks had decreased, although a serious incident caused a young man to receive a blow to the eye with a firework.

A 16-year-old Swede was seriously injured by a firework in Karskrona.

King Harald of Norway and Queen Margrethe of Denmark both addressed the changing times in their New Year’s Eve speeches.

The Republic of Iceland, with just 300,000 inhabitants, celebrated the arrival of 2008 with thousands of tons of fireworks to help see the new year in.

The culmination saw thousands of Icelanders launching fireworks simultaneously between 11pm and 12 midnight on 31st December, flooding the night sky in Reykjavik with unending explosions of colour. It is not uncommon for an Icelandic family to spend the equivalent of several thousand dollars on fireworks for New Year´s Eve.

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We hope you’ve had a great year in 2007 and all the best of luck, good health and great happiness for 2008. Thank you for a great 2007, we know it’s going to be a great year with the Olympic Games in China and an election in the US, to mention just a few events. Have a great 2008!

The clock hit 00:00 in Sydney at 13:00 GMT so they are well into 2008 when the Scandinavians celebrate their New Year. The locals staged a spectacular New Year celebration with a massive fireworks display (and yodelling) watched by over one million people around the harbour of Australia’s largest city.

Australians and travellers alike where drawn to the famous Sydney Harbour for one of the world’s most spectacular New Year’s eve fireworks show – they were not disappointed.

The Sydney Morning Herald reports “that many had to settle for a glimpse, as officials and police were reporting record crowds two hours before the early 9pm (AEDT) fireworks display and that thousands of people were turned away at many vantage points.”

As with the rest of Iceland the capital Reykjavik is renowned for its fantastic new year’s eve (Icelanders call it Gamlarskvold) celebrations, and has through the years managed to attract Hollywood stars such as actor Kiefer Sutherland, Eli Roth, Quentin Tarantino and pop icons such as Blur’s Damon Alban. It is estimated that around 3600 travelers will be spending their vacation in Iceland over the new year. Most come from the UK, then the US, Russia, Japan, Germany and the Nordic countries.

With close to 800 tons of fireworks on sale Icelanders and foreign visitors can expect a world class fireworks show starting around 20:00 on new years eve with it’s highlights at 00:00 and continuing until early morning, 1st of January. To add to the atmosphere and if you are lucky you can see the Northern lights jump around in the sky and just that is a fireworks show in it self.