New year, new beginnings. This week, the millennium arrives without disruption as the dreaded Y2K bug fails to bite. Elsewhere, milestones mark the turning of the year, from a record-breaking mission in space by a Soviet cosmonaut to the arrival of the euro in physical form, giving millions of Europeans a shared currency for the first time since the fall of the Roman Empire. In other corners, the calendar brings little sense of resolution, with continued leadership tensions in post-revolution Romania and renewed climate fears surfacing at the dawn of the 2020s. Dive into a week of New Year promise and uncertainty, as seen on The Independent’s front pages.
