In this Sunday, August 5, 2012 file photo South Africa's Oscar Pistorius starts in the men's semi-finals of the 400-meter in the Olympic Stadium at the 2012 Summer Olympics, London. Pistorius could be granted parole on Friday, Nov. 24, 2023 after nearly 10 years in prison for killing his girlfriend. The double-amputee Olympic runner was convicted of a charge comparable to third-degree murder for shooting Reeva Steenkamp in his home in 2013. He has been in prison since late 2014. (Photo by Anja Niedringhaus/AP Photo)

Tens of thousands of HIV positive prostitutes in the slums of Lagos to ensure a rapid spread of the epidemic. “If you arrive by car, you can smell the HIV virus outside”, joked my driver as we are on track to Badia a criminal slums of Lagos. Badia is a corruption of “Bad Area”. Nigerians have a lack of everything, except black humor. The poor West African country Nigeria, with a population of 140 million people, after India and South Africa the highest number of people with HIV / AIDS. (Photo by Ton Koene/Exclusivepix Media)

Lake Assal is a crater lake in central-western Djibouti. It is located at the western end of Gulf of Tadjoura in the Tadjoura Region, touching Dikhil Region, at the top of the Great Rift Valley, some 120 km (75 mi) west of Djibouti city. Lake Assal is a saline lake which lies 155 m (509 ft) below sea level in the Afar Triangle, making it the lowest point on land in Africa and the third-lowest land depression on Earth after the Dead Sea and Sea of Galilee.

A Tenggerese shaman praying for worshippers at Widodaren cave during the Tenggerese Hindu Yadnya Kasada festival on July 31, 2015 in Probolinggo, East Java, Indonesia. The festival is the main festival of the Tenggerese people and lasts about a month. On the fourteenth day, the Tenggerese make the journey to Mount Bromo to make offerings of rice, fruits, vegetables, flowers and livestock to the mountain gods by throwing them into the volcano's caldera. The origin of the festival lies in the 15th century when a princess named Roro Anteng started the principality of Tengger with her husband Joko Seger, and the childless couple asked the mountain Gods for help in bearing children. The legend says the Gods granted them 24 children but on the provision that the 25th must be tossed into the volcano in sacrifice. The 25th child, Kesuma, was finally sacrificed in this way after initial refusal, and the tradition of throwing sacrifices into the caldera to appease the mountain Gods continues today. (Photo by Ulet Ifansasti/Getty Images)

Girls of the Long Horn Miao ethnic minority group wear headdresses as they prepare gather for Tiaohua or Flower Festival as part of the Lunar New Year on February 6, 2017 in Longga village, Guizhou province, southern China. (Photo by Kevin Frayer/Getty Images)

Ukrainians jump over a bonfire in Kiev, Ukraine, 06 July 2019, as they celebrate the traditional pagan holiday of Ivana Kupala. Ivana Kupala is celebrated, during the summer solstice, on the shortest night of the year, marking the beginning of summer and is celebrated in Ukraine, Belarus, Poland and Russia. People sing and dance around bonfires, play games and perform traditional rituals. Young people jump over bonfires in order to test their bravery. Couples holding hands jump over the flames to test their love. If the couple does not succeed it is predicted to split up. Traditionally, children and young unmarried women wear wreaths of wild flowers on their heads to symbolize purity. (Photo by Sergey Dolzhenko/EPA/EFE)

In this Wednesday, August 21, 1991 file photo, appreciative muscovites hand bread, sausages and flowers to a Soviet tank's driver who helped stop the failed hardline coup in Moscow, Russia. When a group of top Communist officials ousted Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev 30 years ago and flooded Moscow with tanks, the world held its breath, fearing a rollback on liberal reforms and a return to the Cold War confrontation. But the August 1991 coup collapsed in just three days, precipitating the breakup of the Soviet Union that plotters said they were trying to prevent. (Photo by Czarek Sokolowski/AP Photo/File)

Beautiful, strange and occasionally alarming pictures from the shortlist for this year’s Wellcome image awards – which celebrate the very best in science photography and imaging – from an x-ray of a bat to a micrograph of a kidney stone. The exhibition opens on 12 March at three science centres and the Museum of Science and Industry in Manchester. Photo: Scanning electron micrograph (SEM) of an Arabidopsis thaliana flower, also commonly known as thale cress. Some of the anthers are open, revealing pollen grains ready for dispersal. Arabidopsis was the first plant to have its entire genome sequenced and is widely used as a model organism in molecular and plant biology. Horizontal width of image is 1200 microns. Magnification 100x. (Photo by Stefan Eberhard/Wellcome Images)