A grey squirrel looks for some food from a girl in the Botanic Gardens in Glasnevin, Dublin, Ireland on April 3, 2023. (Photo by Damien Eagers/The Irish Times)

A girl bathes her dog, next to her sister on a street of the San Agustin neighborhood of Caracas, Venezuela, Monday, April 3, 2023. (Photo by Matias Delacroix/AP Photo)

A displaced Palestinian girl holds a child as she walks at a tent camp on a rainy day, amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas, in Rafah, in the southern Gaza Strip on May 6, 2024. (Photo by Mohammed Salem/Reuters)

A girl lights a candle during an Easter service in the Volodymyrsky Cathedral, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, in Kyiv, Ukraine, on May 4, 2024. (Photo by Alina Smutko/Reuters)

A girl dismantles a Kalashnikov rifle during a training lesson focused on the “Defence of Ukraine” at the military-patriotic center for schoolchildren in Lviv on May 17, 2023, amid the Russian invasion of Ukraine. (Photo by Yuriy Dyachyshyn/AFP Photo)

“A magician has spent the last 12 months creating a different amazing balloon model every day – including cartoon characters and even a life-sized balloon bike. Magician Rob Driscoll, or Robbie the Wizard as he is known in his magic act, from Portsmouth, Hampshire, has fashioned balloons into various shapes for the past year. He has spent time creating famous cartoon characters such as Gru from Despicable Me, Spongebob Squarepants and Sonic the Hedgehog, which he gives away to children at his shows”. – Caters News Agency. Photo: “Scorpian”. (Photo by Rob Driscoll/Caters News Agency)

As part of FLAIR Melbourne – a Flinders Lane art festival – Melbourne’s Lisa Minogue presents stylised photographic portraits of Australian women of colour, their faces painted vibrantly to accentuate their individuality and encourage the viewer to study each face more closely. Minogue asked each woman the same question: “What do the words “coloured girl” mean to you?”. (Photo by Lisa Minogue/The Guardian)

As the world marks the International Day of the Girl Child, women's rights activists point to progress on a wide array of issues but say more needs to be done to protect girls from child marriage, sexual assault and other forms of exploitation. Here is a selection of pictures showing the daily lives of girls across the globe, all taken by female Associated Press photojournalists. Here: In this December 14, 2015, file photo, a young clown rides in the back of a car following a procession to the Basilica of Our Lady of Guadalupe in Mexico City. Hundreds belonging to various clown associations made their annual pilgrimage to the Basilica to pay their respects to the Virgin of Guadalupe, Mexico's patron saint. (Photo by Rebecca Blackwell/AP Photo)