“What did I know about Chechnya before last week? For someone who grew up in the 1990s the very word Chechnya meant a string of grainy images on TV showing people in battered camouflage outfits, shooting at each other amid destruction and ruin. Fear, wahhabis, Shamil Basayev, terrorism, mountains: these were the words that used to spring to my mind when someone mentioned Chechnya”. – Maxim Shemetov. Photo: Special forces officers stand guard during a government-organised event marking Chechen language day in the centre of the Chechen capital Grozny April 25, 2013. (Photo by Maxim Shemetov/Reuters)

Emergency personnel respond to the scene of a train derailment in Santiago de Compostela, Spain, on Wednesday, July 24, 2013. A train derailed in northwestern Spain on Wednesday night, toppling passenger cars on their sides and leaving at least one torn open as smoke rose into the air. Dozens were feared dead, with possibly even more injured. (Photo by Antonio Hernandez/AP Photo/El correo Gallego)

A driver maneuvers his classic American car along a wet road as a wave crashes against the Malecon in Havana, Cuba on Thursday. Hurricane Sandy blasted across eastern Cuba as a potent Category 2 storm and headed for the Bahamas after causing at least two deaths in the Caribbean. (Photo by Ramon Espinosa/Associated Press)

Undated UK Ministry of Defence handout photo of an RAF Tornado GR4 which has been painted in Gulf War “desert pink” paint scheme to honour the aircraft type's almost continuous operational service since the Royal Air Force helped liberate Kuwait from Saddam Hussein's forces, taken by SAC Rose Buchanan, which has been shortlisted for the general public to pick their favourite RAF Image of the Year. (Photo by SAC Rose Buchanan/MoD Crown Copyright/PA Wire)

Vehicle lights illuminate a street after a massive blackout, in San Juan, Puerto Rico, Thursday, September 22, 2016. Puerto Ricans faced another night of darkness Thursday as crews slowly restored electricity a day after a fire at a power plant caused the aging utility grid to fail and blacked out the entire island. (Photo by Carlos Giusti/AP Photo)

The rarely seen blue sharks photographed by Saeed Rashid in British waters. Elusive blue sharks have recently been spotted off the south coast of England, having moved to the UKs warmer waters to hunt. The carnivorous sharks have been lurking off the coast of the popular British holiday destination, Penzance, in Cornwall. (Photo by Saeed Rashid/Caters News)

North Korean traffic police women chat next to a residential building while off duty Tuesday, October 18, 2016, in Pyongyang, North Korea. (Photo by Wong Maye-E/AP Photo)

A herder stops for reindeers to have a rest while riding along the tundra area in Nenets Autonomous District, Russia, November 27, 2016. In Russia's remote Arctic regions reindeer herding has been a way of life for centuries. Each winter herders in Russia's sparsely populated Nenets Autonomous District corral their reindeers into open-air pens before selecting weak animals to be culled... (Photo by Sergei Karpukhin/Reuters)