Nature – first prize, stories. Pandemic Pigeons – A Love Story. The photographer’s daughter, Merel, cowers after Dollie flies past and perches on the balcony before entering the house in Vlaardingen in the Netherlands on 6 April 2020. “She’s still frightened when Dollie suddenly lands on the balcony railing. I hide my smile behind the camera, as I try to comfort her by saying they won’t hurt you. “I thought he was going to attack me”, she replies. As the nesting pigeons keep coming back to our place, slowly my girls have started to appreciate them – perhaps not as much as I do, but it’s a start”. (Photo by Jasper Doest/World Press Photo 2021)

Revellers enjoy themselves during Hogmanay celebrations in Edinburgh, Scotland on December 31, 2017. (Photo by Russell Cheyne/Reuters)

A family dressed in traditional chinese clothes celebrates the Chinese New Year in Chinatown in Bangkok, Thailand February 8, 2016. (Photo by Jorge Silva/Reuters)

Russians play accordions as they walk near the building of the Federal Security Service (FSB, Soviet KGB successor) in Lubyanskaya Square to mark May Day in Moscow, Russia, Sunday, May 1, 2016. As in Soviet times, about one hundred thousand of cheerful workers paraded across Red Square despite a chilly rain, but instead of red flags with the Communist hammer and sickle, they waved the blue flags of the dominant Kremlin party and the Russian tricolor. (Photo by Alexander Zemlianichenko/AP Photo)

The War in Abkhazia from 1992 to 1993 was fought between Georgian government forces for the most part, and Abkhaz separatist forces, Russian armed forces and North Caucasian militants. Ethnic Georgians who lived in Abkhazia fought largely on the side of Georgian government forces. Ethnic Armenians and Russians within Abkhazia's population largely supported the Abkhazians, and many fought on their side. The separatists received support from thousands of North Caucasus and Cossack militants and from the Russian Federation forces stationed in and near Abkhazia. Here: Abkhazia. Sukhumi, 1993. A house-to-house combat. (Photo by Andrei Solovyov/ITAR-TASS)

In this photo taken Thursday, May 7, 2015 photo, remains of Soviet soldiers killed during World War II lay in a coffin prior to a reburial ceremony at the Sinyavino Heights memorial near the village of Sinyavino, 50 km (31 miles) east of St. Petersburg, Russia. Hundreds of people came to a World War II battleground outside St. Petersburg this week to bury the remains of 964 Soviet soldiers recovered by volunteer search teams. Fifty crimson coffins containing skulls and bones were solemnly buried at the Sinyavino Heights memorial as Russian war songs played and an honor guard fired a salute. (Photo by Dmitry Lovetsky/AP Photo)

Dancers perform during the carnival in Encarnacion, Paraguay on February 26, 2017. Encarnacion is located 375 km south of Asuncion, describes itself as the “Carnival Capital of Paraguay”. (Photo by Norberto Duarte/AFP Photo)

“The Crimean War (October 1853 – February 1856) was a conflict fought between the Russian Empire and an alliance of the French Empire, the British Empire, the Ottoman Empire, and the Kingdom of Sardinia. The war was part of a long-running contest between the major European powers for influence over territories of the declining Ottoman Empire. Most of the conflict took place on the Crimean Peninsula, but there were smaller campaigns in western Anatolia, Caucasus, the Baltic Sea, the Pacific Ocean and the White Sea”. – Wikipedia

Photo: A vivandiere, a female soldier selling provisions and spirits, with the Allied forces during the Crimean War. (Photo by Hulton Archive/Getty Images)