Pictures of the year 2021

The Israeli Iron Dome missile defence system (L) intercepts rockets (R) fired by the Hamas movement towards southern Israel from Beit Lahia in the northern Gaza Strip as seen in the sky above the Gaza Strip overnight on May 14, 2021. Israel bombarded Gaza with artillery and air strikes on Friday, May 14, in response to a new barrage of rocket fire from the Hamas-run enclave, but stopped short of a ground offensive in the conflict that has now claimed more than 100 Palestinian lives. As the violence intensified, Israel said it was carrying out an attack "in the Gaza Strip" although it later clarified there were no boots on the ground. AFP

A composite image of five separate photographs taken with a single fixed camera shows a sunspot and the International Space Station in silhouette as it passes across the Sun, seen from near Tbilisi, Georgia June 19, 2021. REUTERS

The sun rises in front of the Christ the Redeemer statue in Rio de Janeiro on March 24, 2021. - Christ the Redeemer is celebrating its 90th anniversary in October 2021 and is receiving restoration work to ensure that it looks its best for the public and visiting tourists. AFP

Shi'ite Muslim pilgrims gather to commemorate Ashura, the holiest day on the Shi'ite Muslim calendar in the holy city of Kerbala, Iraq, August 19, 2021. REUTERS

A family member comforts a patient breathing with the help of oxygen being provided by a Gurdwara, a place of worship for Sikhs, under a tent installed along the roadside amid Covid-19 coronavirus pandemic in Ghaziabad on May 4, 2021. AFP

A bolt of lightning crosses the sky as people look at buildings displaying a light show on the eve of the 100th anniversary of the Chinese Communist Party in Beijing on June 30, 2021. AFP

Humaira Mustapha, whose 2 daughters were kidnapped by gunmen at the Government Girls Secondary School, cries at her home, the day after the abduction of over 300 schoolgirls in Jangebe, a village in Zamfara State, northwest of Nigeria on February 27, 2021. - More than 300 schoolgirls were snatched from dormitories by gunmen in the middle of the night in northwestern Zamfara state on February 26, in the third known mass kidnapping of students since December. AFP

Smoke billows as an air bomb is dropped on the Jala Tower during an Israeli airstrike in Gaza city controlled by the Palestinian Hamas movement, on May 15, 2021. - Israeli air strikes pounded the Gaza Strip, killing 10 members of an extended family and demolishing a key media building, while Palestinian militants launched rockets in return amid violence in the West Bank. Israel's air force targeted the 13-floor Jala Tower housing Qatar-based Al-Jazeera television and the Associated Press news agency. AFP

Mercedes' British driver Lewis Hamilton (L) and Red Bull's Dutch driver Max Verstappen collide during the Italian Formula One Grand Prix at the Autodromo Nazionale circuit in Monza, on September 12, 2021. AFP

An injured resident of Togoga, a village about 20km west of Mekele, arrives on a stretcher to the Ayder referral hospital in Mekele, the capital of Tigray region, Ethiopia, on June 23, 2021, a day after a deadly airstrike on a market in Ethiopia's war-torn northern Tigray region, where a seven-month-old conflict surged again. - Witnesses and medical personnel said dozens were killed or wounded at a busy market in Togoga town on June 22, 2021, as ballot counting was underway across much of the rest of the country following June 21's national election. AFP

A Syrian child poses atop a stack of neutralised shells at a metal scrapyard on the outskirts of Maaret Misrin town in the northwestern Idlib province, on March 10, 2021. A Syrian family who was displaced from the village of Latamneh in Hama's northern countryside 4 years ago, has found a source of income in collecting and selling metal scrap, including unexploded ordnance shells and spent ammunition casings, a business all family participates in. AFP

Palestinian Muslim worshippers pray near the rubble of a destroyed mosque in Beit Lahia, in the northern Gaza Strip, on May 27, 2021. A ceasefire was reached late last week after 11 days of deadly violence between Israel and the Hamas movement which runs Gaza, stopping Israel's devastating bombardment on the overcrowded Palestinian coastal enclave which, according to the Gaza health ministry, killed 248 Palestinians, including 66 children, and wounded more than 1,900 people. Meanwhile, rockets from Gaza claimed 12 lives in Israel, including one child and an Israeli soldier. AFP

A member of the Yemeni security forces executes one of nine men, convicted of involvement in the assassination of Huthi political leader Saleh al-Sammad three years ago, at a public square in the Yemeni capital Sanaa, on September 18, 2021. - Huthi rebels said they executed nine people today for involvement in the killing of Saleh al-Sammad, then head of the Huthis' supreme political councilone of their top leaders, in a 2018 air strike claimed by Saudi Arabia. AFP

Members of a Kurdish family from Dohuk in Iraq are seen in a forest near the Polish-Belarus border while waiting for the border guard patrol, near Narewka, Poland, on November 9, 2021. The three-generation family of 16 members with seven minors, including the youngest who is 5 months old, spent about 20 days in the forest and was pushed back to Belarus 8 times. They claim they were beaten and frightened with dogs by Belarusian soldiers. AFP

Exhausted grave diggers rest in between funerals at a cemetery designated for Covid-19 victims in Bandung on June 15, 2021, as infection numbers soar in Indonesia. AFP

Aerial view of a gravedigger walking among COVID-19 victims' graves at the Nossa Senhora Aparecida cemetery in Manaus, Amazonas state, Brazil, on April 29, 2021. - Brazil, with a population of 212,000,000 people, surpassed Thursday the 400,000 deaths due to COVID-19, and is second in number only to the US. AFP

Debbie Carroll Boyce, Ms. Senior America 2011, pulls back the curtains on the stage at the Ms. Texas Senior America Pageant in Dallas, Texas, U.S., July 24, 2021. Picture taken July 24, 2021. REUTERS

In this photograph taken on September 28, 2021 Taliban fighters ride on paddle boats at Qargha Lake on the outskirts of Kabul. "This is Afghanistan!" a Taliban fighter shouts on the pirate ship ride at a fairground in western Kabul, as his armed comrades cackle and whoop on board the rickety attraction. AFP

A Taliban fighter walks past a beauty salon with images of women defaced using spray paint in Shar-e-Naw in Kabul on August 18, 2021. AFP

US socialite Kim Kardashian arrives for the 2021 Met Gala at the Metropolitan Museum of Art on September 13, 2021 in New York. This year's Met Gala has a distinctively youthful imprint, hosted by singer Billie Eilish, actor Timothee Chalamet, poet Amanda Gorman and tennis star Naomi Osaka, none of them older than 25. The 2021 theme is "In America: A Lexicon of Fashion." AFP

A gibbon walks amid models of vehicles at a zoo in the park of miniatures in Bakhchisaray, Crimea May 24, 2021. REUTERS

Police officers take cover as they clash with protesters after an officer shot and killed a black man in Brooklyn Center, Minneapolis, Minnesota on April 11,2021. Protests broke out April 11, 2021 night after US police fatally shot a young Black man in a suburb of Minneapolis where a former police officer is currently on trial for the murder of George Floyd. Hundreds of people gathered outside the police station in Brooklyn Center, northwest of Minneapolis. Police fired teargas and flash bangs at the demonstrators, according to an AFP videojournalist at the scene. AFP

A screen shows a picture of Chinese President Xi Jinping at a traffic junction in Hotan, Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, China, April 30, 2021. Picture taken April 30, 2021. REUTERS

A couple of astronauts from a team from Europe and Israel walk in spacesuits during a training mission for planet Mars at a site that simulates an off-site station at the Ramon Crater in Mitzpe Ramon in Israel's southern Negev desert on October 10, 2021. Six astronauts from Portugal, Spain, Germany, the Netherlands, Austria, and Israel will be cut off from the world for a month, from October 4-31, only able leave their habitat in spacesuits as if they were on Mars. Their mission, the AMADEE-20 Mars simulation, will be carried out in a Martian terrestrial analog and directed by a dedicated Mission Support Center in Austria, to conduct experiments ahead of future human and robotic Mars exploration missions. AFP

Serbia's Novak Djokovic reacts after falling on the court while playing against Italy's Matteo Berrettini during their men's singles quarter-final tennis match on Day 11 of The Roland Garros 2021 French Open tennis tournament in Paris on June 9, 2021 .AFP

A photograph taken on September 13, 2021 shows the Arc de Triomphe, in Paris, wrapped in silver-blue fabric as it was designed by the late artist Christo. Work has begun on wrapping the Arc de Triomphe in Paris in silvery-blue fabric as a posthumous tribute to the artist Christo, who had dreamt of the project for decades. Bulgarian-born Christo, a longtime Paris resident, had plans for sheathing the imposing war memorial at the top of the Champs-Elysees while renting an apartment near it in the 1960s. AFP

USA's Simone Biles gets ready to compete in the artistic gymnastics women's balance beam final of the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games at Ariake Gymnastics Centre in Tokyo on August 3, 2021. AFP

An overview shows Uganda's Stephen Kissa competing in the men's 10000m final during the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games at the Olympic Stadium in Tokyo on July 30, 2021. AFP

Migants climb a sea wall in the northern town of Fnideq after attempting to cross the border from Morocco to Spain's North African enclave of Ceuta on May 19, 2021. Spain stepped up diplomatic pressure on Rabat as its prime minister flew into Ceuta, vowing to "restore order" in the North African enclave after a record 8,000 migrants reached its beaches from Morocco. AFP

Two members of SAPS chase and shoot rubber bullets at two suspected looters outside a warehouse storing alcohol in Durban on July 16, 2021, in the midst of an ongoing alcohol ban after protestors have clashed with police following a week of unrest in South Africa. South African President Cyril Ramaphosa said that those behind the riots and violence that have shaken the country and claimed 212 lives in the past week had sought to foment an "insurrection". "Those behind these acts have sought to provoke a popular insurrection amongst our people," he said in a televised address. AFP

The pack rides during the 118th edition of the Paris-Roubaix one-day classic cycling race, between Compiegne and Roubaix, northern France, on October 3, 2021. AFP

A devotee takes a dip in the waters of Yamuna river as a part of rituals for the upcoming Hindu festival of Chhat puja amid foam created by pollution in the water in New Delhi on November 8, 2021. AFP

A polar bear is seen on ice floes in the British Channel in the Franz Josef Land archipelago on August 16, 2021. AFP

A photo taken from a helicopter shows Researcher Ninis Rosqvist at the peak of the southern summit of Kebnekaise in northern Sweden, as she uses equipment to take GPS measurements on the mountain?s height on August 26, 2021. In the Arctic in Sweden's far north, global warming is happening three times faster than in the rest of the world. Kebnekaise is home to Sweden's two highest peaks. The southern summit, which was the tallest, has shrunk as the glacier at its top is melting. AFP

A picture taken on April 9, 2021 in Saignelegier shows a horse being airlifted during a test by Swiss army forces on hoisting horses with a helicopter. The scientific project, carried out by the Vetsuisse faculty of veterinary medicine and the Swiss army veterinary service, aims at transporting and rapidly evacuating injured horses to a medical veterinary infrastructure. AFP

A local resident gestures as he holds n empty water hose during an attempt to extinguish forest fires approaching the village of Pefki on Evia (Euboea) island, Greece's second largest island, on August 8, 2021. Hundreds of Greek firefighters fought desperately on August 8 to control wildfires on the island of Evia that have charred vast areas of pine forest, destroyed homes and forced tourists and locals to flee. Greece and Turkey have been battling devastating fires for nearly two weeks as the region suffered its worst heatwave in decades, which experts have linked to climate change. AFP

A demonstrator falls as they are hit by water cannon during clashes with riot police amid ongoing protests against the government of Colombian President Ivan Duque in Bogota on June 12, 2021. Dozens of people have been killed in protests that erupted around the country on April 28, initially against a tax hike that would have mostly affected the middle classes, but which have morphed into a major anti-government movement. AFP

Dark smoke drifts over a hotel complex during a massive forest fire which engulfed a Mediterranean resort region on Turkey's southern coast near the town of Manavgat, on July 29, 2021. At least three people were reported dead on July 29, 2021 and more than 100 injured as firefighters battled blazes engulfing a Mediterranean resort region on Turkey's southern coast. Officials also launched an investigation into suspicions that the fires that broke out Wednesday in four locations to the east of the tourist hotspot Antalya were the result of arson. AFP

In this aerial picture taken on April 26, 2021, burning pyres of victims who lost their lives due to the Covid-19 coronavirus are seen at a cremation ground in New Delhi. AFP

Aerial view show a deforested area of Amazonia rainforest in Labrea, Amazonas state, Brazil, on September 15, 2021. The Amazon basin has, until recently, absorbed large amounts of humankind's ballooning carbon emissions, helping stave off the nightmare of unchecked climate change. But studies indicate the rainforest is hurtling toward a "tipping point," at which it will dry up and turn to savannah, its 390 billion trees dying off en masse. Already, the destruction is quickening, especially since far-right President Jair Bolsonaro took office in 2019 in Brazil -- home to 60 percent of the Amazon -- with a push to open protected lands to agribusiness and mining. AFP

A young Palestinian girl sits in front of her home, damaged by Israeli bombardment, in Gaza City, on May 20, 2021. Israel and the Palestinians are mired in their worst conflict in years as Israel pounds the Gaza Strip with air strikes and artillery, while Hamas militants fire rockets into the Jewish state. AFP