Yoko Ono urged the world to give peace a chance Tuesday as she unveiled a tower of light dedicated to her late husband, John Lennon, near Reykjavik, Iceland.

Lennon's son Sean Lennon, Beatles drummer Ringo Starr and George Harrison's widow Olivia joined Ono and fans of the late Beatle at the ceremony, falling on what would have been Lennon's 67th birthday.

Yoko Ono Lennon flashes a peace sign in New York in 2006. She marked Lennon's birthday with opening of the Imagine Peace Tower.(AP Photo/Paul Hawthorne)
AP

"We're all here for Johnny's birthday and the big light," Starr said. "I love the light."

Ono, 74, designed the tower, a beam of light radiating from a wishing well, which is engraved with the words "imagine peace" in 24 languages.

"I consider myself very fortunate to see the dream my husband and I dreamt together become reality," said Ono, who designed the tower 40 years ago while Lennon was alive.

"I got the idea because I just liked the romantic idea of having a building that just appears, emerges once in a while but sometimes it is not seen," she said on Iceland's Channel 2 television.

She said she chose Iceland for the tower because it could be powered with clean thermal energy.

"It's so beautiful," she said. "There's a certain strangeness to it. I would like to say it's magical."

It will be lit each year between Lennon's birthday, Oct. 9, and the anniversary of his death on Dec. 8.

Ono said she had gathered hundreds of thousands of wishes for world peace at art galleries around the world that will be buried in capsules on the island, each topped with a tree.

In New York, Lennon fans gathered in their annual homage to the late Beatle in an area known as Strawberry Fields.

Lennon was killed by deranged fan Mark David Chapman in 1980 in New York.

With files from the Associated Press