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)

A South Indian dancer puts finishing touches to his make up as he gets ready to performs a traditional dance during a promotion event for Indian tourism in the Kerala state, in Kolkata, Eastern India, 28 January 2020. (Photo by Piyal Adhikary/EPA/EFE)

Palestinian groom Mohamed abu Daga and his bride Israa wear face masks amid the COVID-19 epidemic, during a photoshoot at a studio before their wedding ceremony in Khan Yunis in the southern Gaza Strip, on March 23, 2020. Authorities in Gaza confirmed on March 22 the first two cases of novel coronavirus, identifying them as Palestinians who had travelled to Pakistan and were being held in quarantine since their return, as the United Nations warned of potential disastrous outcomes to an outbreak given the high poverty rates and weak health system in the coastal strip, under Israeli blockade since 2007. (Photo by Said Khatib/AFP Photo)

Rajesh Babu, a police officer, wearing a helmet depicting coronavirus, requests a commuter to stay at home during a 21-day nationwide lockdown to limit the spreading of coronavirus disease (COVID-19), in Chennai, India, March 28, 2020. (Photo by P. Ravikumar/Reuters)

Penitentiary system guards carry an inmate with symptoms related to the novel coronavirus at the COVID-19 unit of San Juan de Dios hospital in Guatemala City on July 13, 2020. (Photo by Johan Ordonez/AFP Photo)

Police intervene as two women fight at a pro-law enforcement rally that clashed with counter protesters demonstrating against racial inequality, in Denver, Colorado, U.S. July 19, 2020. (Photo by Kevin Mohatt/Reuters)

A South Korean marine in action during their regular drill on Yeonpyeong Island, South Korea November 1, 2018. (Photo by Jeon Heon-Kyun/Pool via Reuters)

Taliban fighter, Mostashhed from Wardak province, looks on as he visits Kabul for the first time as hundreds of Taliban fighters take a day off to visit the amusement park at Kabul's Qargha reservoir, at the outskirts of Kabul, Afghanistan on October 8, 2021. (Photo by Jorge Silva/Reuters)