A man takes his pet African spurred tortoise called Lupin for a walk during a heatwave in Tokyo, Japan on July 3, 2022. (Photo by Masatoshi Okauchi/Rex Features/Shutterstock)

As the world marks the International Day of the Girl Child, women's rights activists point to progress on a wide array of issues but say more needs to be done to protect girls from child marriage, sexual assault and other forms of exploitation. Here is a selection of pictures showing the daily lives of girls across the globe, all taken by female Associated Press photojournalists. Here: In this December 14, 2015, file photo, a young clown rides in the back of a car following a procession to the Basilica of Our Lady of Guadalupe in Mexico City. Hundreds belonging to various clown associations made their annual pilgrimage to the Basilica to pay their respects to the Virgin of Guadalupe, Mexico's patron saint. (Photo by Rebecca Blackwell/AP Photo)

An internally displaced Afghan girl plays outside her shelter, amid the spread of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19), in Kabul, Afghanistan on May 7, 2020. (Photo by Mohammad Ismail/Reuters)

Mohamed Mostafa, 35, carries dyed yarns at a dye workshop in old Cairo, Egypt, March 17, 2016. Egypt's hard currency crisis and competition from modern factories in Asia and at home threaten one of the last dye workshops in Egypt. But one of its owners takes comfort in the trade's ancient resilience. Mohamed Mostafa boasts that the profession dates back 3,000 years, so it can survive anything. (Photo by Amr Abdallah Dalsh/Reuters)

A man helps an elderly woman to run for cover after heavy shelling on the only escape route used by locals, while Russian troops advance towards the capital, in Irpin, near Kyiv, Ukraine on March 6, 2022. (Photo by Carlos Barria/Reuters)

“Snowflake (c. 1964 – November 24, 2003) was an albino gorilla. He was the only known albino gorilla so far, and the most popular resident of the Barcelona Zoo in Catalonia, Spain. Originally named Nfumu Ngui in Fang language ("white gorilla") by his captor, he was then nicknamed Floquet de Neu (Catalan for little snowflake) by his keeper Jordi Sabater Pi. On his arrival to Barcelona where he was given an official reception by the then Mayor of Barcelona, Josep Maria de Porcioles, in November 1966, he was called Blancanieves (“Snow White”) in the newspaper Tele/Exprés. But he became famous with the name given to him by Sabater when National Geographic Magazine featured him on the main page in March 1967, with the English name Snowflake. This name spread among the press (Stern, Life, Paris-Match) and was later translated to Spanish as Copito de Nieve. Sabater himself called the gorilla Floquet or Copi, and in the later years Nfumu. The asteroid 95962 Copito, discovered by Catalan astronomer J. Manteca, is named in his honour”.

Onlookers gather around a struggling beached whale in the Yoff neighborhood of Dakar, Senegal Wednesday, May 21, 2008. Residents worked Wednesday morning to save some of the more than 80 whales that were stranded on the beach Tuesday night. This whale was successfully towed out to sea by a fishing boat, though at least 20 others lay dead on the beach by midday Wednesday. (Photo by Rebecca Blackwell/AP Photo)

Musafir, a pet monkey, eats sweets on a pavement in Kolkata, India, June 9, 2016. (Photo by Rupak De Chowdhuri/Reuters)