The Rio de Janeiro Olympics kick off on August 5 for some two weeks of competitive games drawing athletes as well as audiences from around the world. As they prepare to cover the event, Reuters photographers look back on their favourite pictures from past Olympics where they captured the action on the ground as well as the participants' tears and joy that followed. (Photo by Lucy Nicholson/Reuters)

Indian Air Force personnel parade during the 85th Air Force Day celebrations at Hindon Air Force base in Ghaziabad on October 8, 2017. (Photo by AFP Photo/Stringer)

Kelly Clarkson, Kelsea Ballerini and Carly Pearce perform at the 56th Annual CMA Awards at Bridgestone Arena in Nashville, Tennessee, U.S. November 9, 2022. (Photo by Mario Anzuoni/Reuters)

Members of the Indian Army display aerobatic Taekwondo skills during the 11th Reunion and 262nd Anniversary of Army Service Crops in Bangalore, India, 09 December 2022. The 11th ASC Reunion & 262nd Corps Day will be held at Army Service Corps (ASC) Centre & College on 8th and 9th of December 2022, to showcase the military capabilities. Indian Army Service Corps, established in 1760, is an arm of the Indian Army handling logistic support. (Photo by Jagadeesh N.V./EPA/EFE/Rex Features/Shutterstock)

Tourists pose for a selfie in an old American car in front of a wall bearing a graffiti of the Committees for the Defense of the Revolution (CDR) in Havana, on September 27, 2023. September 28 marks the 63th anniversary of the Committees for the Defense of the Revolution (CDR), the so-called “eyes and ears of the Revolution” created by the late Cuban leader Fidel Castro. (Photo by Yamil Lage/AFP Photo)

A Pakistani policeman wades across floodwaters in Lahore on August 19, 2024. Flash floods triggered by the latest spell of monsoon rains are wreaking havoc across parts of Pakistan, claiming the lives of 14 people in the previous 24 hours, an official at the provincial disaster management authority said on August 19. (Photo by Tahir Jamil Khan/Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty)

Children walk past the partially collapsed boundary wall of a school and a Buddhist shrine that were damaged during the earthquake earlier this year at Khumjung, a typical Sherpa village in Solukhumbu district also known as the Everest region, in this picture taken November 30, 2015. (Photo by Navesh Chitrakar/Reuters)

The civilised world lies on its knees, a sickness wracking its body. The affliction causes a necrotising of tissues so perfectly uniform in distribution that victims take on the appearance of corpses long before death occurs due to organ failure or secondary infections. ...