Police officers laugh as Greenpeace activists create a burnt smoldering rain-forest with a lifelike animatronic orangutan at the headquarters of Oreo cookies, in protest over their use of palm oil on November 19, 2018 in Uxbridge, England. Greenpeace is calling on the makers of Oreo to stop buying palm oil from Wilmar, the largest palm oil producer, who they say have destroyed 70,000 hectares of Indonesian rain forest in the last two years. (Photo by Chris J. Ratcliffe for Greenpeace via Getty Images)

Twenty-four-year-old Maryam Aghayee makes hyper-realistic baby dolls acting as surrogates for some Iranian families who are apprehensive of having more children. “It has been about three or four months since I started this work”, says Maryam in Tehran, Iran on October 7, 2020. “After making my second doll, many orders have been coming in. The second doll was much more realistic than the previous one. After making my second doll, I said that from now on I can take customer orders. I did not intend to start a business from the beginning because it was a hobby, but after the second doll, the demand for these kinds of dolls increased, customers want to have such dolls”. (Photo by Majid Asgaripour/WANA (West Asia News Agency) via Reuters)

Devotees of the small farming village of Bibiclat celebrate the Feast of Saint John the Baptist while covered in banana leaves and mud on June 24, 2025 in Aliaga, Philippines. Known as the “Taong Putik” (mud people), the ritual happens yearly in this small farming village as their own version of expressing their faith and celebrating the feast of Saint John the Baptist whom the survivors of the Japanese occupation in 1944 in their area prayed to for rain to save their fellow villagers. (Photo by Ezra Acayan/Getty Images)

An incredible view of Thunderstorms light up the insides of clouds near a beautiful sky line. This is truly heavenly weather as pictures taken from an airplane cockpit reveal what pilots see from above. It looks like at cruising altitude the weather really hots up, with the flight deck revealing some amazing scenes. Thunderstorms light up the insides of clouds, lightening streaks across the sky like cracks in a windscreen, the northern lights sweep uninterrupted across the sky and the galaxy stretches on forever. The pictures were captured by senior first officer Christiaan van Heijst, a 33-year-old from the Netherlands, and his friend Daan Krans. (Photo by Christiaan van Heijst/Daan Krans/Caters News Agency)

File photo dated 21/04/66 of Pattie Boyd in London's West End wearing a mini skirt, as the British designer Mary Quant, widely credited with popularising the mini skirt has recalled its “feeling of freedom and liberation” 50 years after she took the fashion world by storm. Quant, who named the skirt after her favourite make of car, said she “couldn't have imagined” in 1964 that it would become a staple of women's clothing, but added: “It seemed then to be obvious, and so right”. (Photo by PA Wire)

A relative (L) of Champa Devi, 88, sits next to her body, minutes after her death at Mukti Bhavan (Salvation House) at Varanasi, in the northern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh, June 21, 2014. The city of Varanasi, on the banks of the River Ganges, is widely considered Hinduism's holiest city and many Hindus believe that dying there and having their remains scattered in the Ganges allows their soul to escape a cycle of death and rebirth, attaining “moksha” or salvation. “Mukti Bhavan” or “Salvation House”, is a charity-run hostel that caters for people who wish to come to Varanasi to die. Guests can normally stay up to two weeks after which, if they haven't yet passed away, they are gently asked to leave. (Photo by Danish Siddiqui/Reuters)

Most Russians intending to vote for Vladimir Putin in Sunday's election say stability is at the root of their faith in their candidate – though many young voters believe it's time for a change of leader. Putin, 65, is expected to win a fourth term in office with 69 percent of the vote, according to the latest survey by a state-run pollster. Reuters correspondents and photographers who travelled around the country talking to voters ahead of the March 18 election found nothing to contradict expectation of an emphatic Putin victory. (Photo by Anton Vaganov/Reuters)

From house breaking in Johannesburg to hippos on the loose in Tbilisi to rioters attacking a policewoman in Burundi, Reuters photographers tell the story behind some of the most iconic pictures of the year. Here: Protesters drag a female police officer accused of shooting a protester in the Buterere neighbourhood of Bujumbura, Burundi, May 12, 2015. Goran Tomasevic: Protesters started throwing stones at a group of police, who then started to run away. The policewoman in the photo, Medikintos Inabeza, 33, got left behind and then some protesters started to push her, saying that she had shot a female protestor in the stomach with an AK47 rifle. I didn't see anything of that. There were 5 or 10 protesters pushing the policewoman at first, then others came and joined in. Up to 20 or 30 protesters were surrounding her at one point. The protesters kicked and beat her very badly; I also saw a couple of knives. I thought they were going to kill her... (Photo by Goran Tomasevic/Reuters)