Shortlisted: Pooyan Shadpoor, Houcheraghi. While walking along the shore of Larak, Iran – an island in the Persian Gulf – Shadpoor came across this luminous scene. The “magical lights of (the) plankton ... enchanted me so that I snapped the shot”, he writes. (Photo by Pooyan Shadpoor/2016 EPOTY)

The Wadi al-Salam cemetery, Arabic for “Peace Valley”, is seen in Najaf, south of Baghdad, Iraq August 3, 2016. The world's largest cemetery, in Iraq's Shi'ite holy city of Najaf, is expanding at double its usual rate as Shi'ite militias bury their dead from the war against Islamic State. The Wadi al-Salam cemetery, Arabic for “Peace Valley” has a special place in the hearts of Shi'ite Muslims as it surrounds the Mausoleum of their first imam, Ali Bin Abi Talib, a cousin and son-in-law of Prophet Mohammad. (Photo by Alaa Al-Marjani/Reuters)

A policeman kick in the door of a residence next to the Black Panther headquarters in New Orleans as they moved in following a shootout, September 15, 1970. Other heavily armed policemen stand at ready. (Photo by Jack Thornell/AP Photo)

Carnival revelers perform during the Academicos do Baixo Augustaa carnival “bloco” parade in Sao Paulo, Brazil, Sunday, February 24, 2019. (Photo by Andre Penner/AP Photo)

A member of Korean Federation for Environmental Movement in a Santa Claus outfit attaches dumped cigarette butts at a cigarette butt Christmas tree in front of Korea Tobacco & Ginseng Corporation office in Seoul, South Korea, Monday, December 23, 2019. The environmental activist group called for a ban on the use of plastic for cigarette filters as part of efforts to protect the environment from toxic plastic pollution. (Photo by Ahn Young-joon/AP Photo)

A woman sits behind a bicycle on a cold winter morning in New Delhi, December 31, 2019. (Photo by Anushree Fadnavis/Reuters)

Final-year student Alina Repkina prepares for a livestream of the Last Bell ceremony for school leavers at secondary school No 11 in Rostov-On-Don, Russia on May 30, 2020. It is the first time in Russia that such ceremonies have been held via video link due to the coronavirus lockdown restrictions. (Photo by Valery Matytsin/TASS)

Bangladeshi farmers busy to processing jute in Dhamrai outskirts of Dhaka on July 06, 2020. (Photo by Zabed Hasnain Chowdhury/ZUMA Wire/Rex Features/Shutterstock)