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Pictures of the year: World News 2014

Thursday 11 December 2014 14:16 GMT

Sunlight streams through the windows of the Waterman Opera House, Nebraska

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

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1/100Pictures of the year: World News 2014

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

January 2014

Sunlight streams through the windows of the Waterman Opera House, Nebraska

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

January 2014

Palestinian policemen stand near burning tyres set ablaze by demonstrators outside Jalazoun refugee camp near the West Bank city of Ramallah

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

January 2014

Hindu pilgrims take a dip at the confluence of the Ganges River and the Bay of Bengal, an act which they consider to be holy, at Sagar Island, south of Kolkata

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

January 2014

Anti-government protesters blow whistles and shout slogans as they blocking a main road during the 'Bangkok Shutdown' campaign rally at Ratchaprasong shopping district in central of Bangkok

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

January 2014

Some water still continues to flow over the Falls despite the frigid temperatures

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

January 2014

A worker stuffs a toy bear with cotton at a toy factory in Wuhan, Hubei province

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

January 2014

Saudi Hawks display team perform during the opening of the Bahrain International Airshow 2014, in Sakhir, south of the capital Manama

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

January 2014

Female police trainees and their male counterparts practise firing their weapons at a shooting range during a refresher training programme in Najaf

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

January 2014

Film star Sylvester Stallone and MGM Chairman and CEO Gary Barber watch from the stage as Leo the Lion steps onto a cement block for his paw prints during a ceremony at the TCL Chinese Theater celebrating the Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer studio's 90th anniversary in Hollywood, California

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

February 2014

Fireworks explode around the Fisht Olympic Stadium at the end of the Closing Ceremony of the Sochi Winter Olympics at the Olympic Park in Sochi

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

February 2014

Women walk in front of the Dinamo Kiev's stadium in Kiev

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

February 2014

Reflected in a puddle of melted snow, people and dogs walk past umbrellas suspended from trees at Spanish Banks Beach in Vancouver, British Columbia

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

February 2014

Protesters burn as they stand behind burning barricades during clashes with police in Kiev

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

February 2014

Russian Alexander Emereev (L) and Dmitry Zaytsev hold their marriage book after getting married in Buenos Aires

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

February 2014

Amanda Perdomo celebrates after being elected Queen of the Santa Cruz carnival in Santa Cruz de Tenerife on the Canary island of Tenerife

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

February 2014

A demonstrator jumps on a shield wall formed by riot police during a protest against the government of Venezuela's President Nicolas Maduro, in Caracas

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

February 2014

People look on as a veterinarian prepares to dismember a giraffe named Marius after it was killed at Copenhagen Zoo

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

March 2014

A frontier soldier from the People's Liberation Army jumps through a ring of fire as part of training in Heihe, Heilongjiang province

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

March 2014

A woman prays for the deceased of the earthquake and tsunami, as snow falls, at a place where she was employed at a photo studio at the time, in Rikuzentakata, Iwate prefecture, Japan

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

March 2014

Float builder Jacques Tilly carries the head of a figure depicting Russian President Vladimir Putin in a shopping cart in Duesseldorf, Germany

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

March 2014

A woman walks past barricades set up by anti-Yanukovich protestors at Kiev's Independence Square

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

March 2014

A woman leaves a messages of support and hope for the passengers of the missing Malaysia Airlines MH370 in central Kuala Lumpur

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

March 2014

A Syrian man holds a crying girl as he gestures following an air strike by government forces on the Sahour neighbourhood of the northern Syrian city of Aleppo

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

March 2014

An Indian labourer sifts coloured powder, known as 'gulal', to be used during the forthcoming spring festival of Holi, inside a factory at Fulbari village on the outskirts of Siliguri

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

March 2014

An Afghan honor of guard stands next to pictures of late Afghan Vice President Field Marshal Mohammed Qasim Fahim outside his house in Kabul, Afghanistan

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

March 2014

Balloons in the shape of doves are released into the air during a memorial service for tsunami victims at the former Yuriage junior high school in Natori, Miyagi Prefecture on the third anniversary of the massive earthquake and tsunami that hit northern Japan

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

March 2014

A Sikh warrior, wearing a huge turban attends the annual fair of 'Hola Mohalla' in Anandpur Sahib, in the northern Indian state of Punjab

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

March 2014

Women toss their bras during the 5th Pink Bra Spring and Bra Toss and help Push Up the Fight Against Breast Cancer event at the Trocadero Square near the Eiffel Tower in Paris

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

April 2014

General view during a fire in Valparaiso, 110 km west of Santiago, Chile

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

April 2014

A U.S. flag sticks out the window of a damaged hot rod car in a suburban area after a tornado near Vilonia, Arkansas

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

April 2014

A veterinary staff member of the Sumatran Orangutan Conservation Programme center conducts medical examinations on a 14-year-old male orangutan found with air gun metal pellets embedded in his body in Sibolangit district in northern Sumatra island

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

April 2014

Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff (R) poses with workers during a visit to the construction site of the metro station Sao Conrado (Line 4) in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

April 2014

Staff watch a speech by Russian President Vladimir Putin at a pizza restaurant in Simferopol

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

April 2014

Men walk on a illuminated bridge in downtown Dubai, with in the background Burj Khalifa tower during the Dubai Festival of Lights

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

April 2014

A woman stands with her daughters during Newroz celebrations at Kazlicesme district in Istanbul

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

April 2014

Visitors of the Holi Festival of Colours throw special colored powders in the air in Barcelona, Spain

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

April 2014

Volunteers light candles during the "Light of Peace in the Philippines" event in Oton town at Iloilo province, central Philippines. The event achieved a Guinness world record for the largest candle-lit image with 56,690 candles forming the map of the Philippines, breaking the previous record held by Pakistan

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

April 2014

A poster bearing the image of a Pakistani girl whose parents, lawyers say, were killed in a drone strike, lies in a field at an undisclosed location in the northwestern Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province. A group of artists in Pakistan are hoping to generate "empathy" among US drone operators by placing giant posters of children in the country's troubled tribal regions

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

April 2014

A view of the rescue operation underway after the ferry Sewol sank in waters off Jindo Island in the southwestern province of South Jeolla

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

May 2014

Pope Francis prays at the Western Wall in Jerusalem's Old City

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

May 2014

A boy gestures in front of a barricade on fire during a protest after French troops opened fire at protesters blocking a road in Bambari

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

May 2014

Kashmiri government employees demonstrate as riot police spray purple-dyed water cannon during a protest march in Srinagar

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

May 2014

Ukrainian National guard troops taking part in an exercise in presence of acting Ukrainian Prime Minister on the shooting range not far from Kiev

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

May 2014

Brazilian soccer fan Marilza Guimaraes da Silva (63) plays with a ball, dressed in one of her many outfits matching the colors of the Brazil's national flag (green, yellow, white and blue) at her home in Brasilia

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

May 2014

Fully-veiled Iraqi women flash the sign for victory with their ink-stained fingers after casting their vote in Iraq's first parliamentary election since US troops withdrew at a polling station in Baghdad's Karrada commercial district

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

May 2014

A man kisses his son after he was rescued from the mine explosion in Turkey

AFP/Getty Images

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

May 2014

A wounded man sits as he is treated at a makeshift hospital following a reported bombardment with explosive-packed "barrel bombs" by Syrian government forces in the al-Sakhour district of the northern city of Aleppo

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

May 2014

Supporters of Hindu nationalist Narendra Modi, the prime ministerial candidate for India's main opposition Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), shower confetti from atop a bus in the western Indian city of Ahmedabad

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

May 2014

A light show featuring a ballet dancer and swans from Swan Lake is projected onto spraying water by the Vivid Aquatique Water Theatre during a preview of the Vivid Sydney light and music festival

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

May 2014

People visiting "The Gateway to Hell," a huge burning gas crater in the heart of Turkmenistan's Karakum desert

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

June 2014

A supporter of Afghan presidential candidate Abdullah Abdullah holds an Afghan flag after an election campaign rally in Paghman district of Kabul

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

June 2014

Boys watch a screening of the 2014 World Cup Group A soccer match between Brazil and Mexico, at the slum of Varjao on the outskirts of Brasilia

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

June 2014

Spain's newly crowned King Felipe VI walks toward the balcony of the Royal Palace to wave to the crowd in Madrid, Spain

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

June 2014

An anti-royalist protester shouts as he waves a republican flag during a demonstration in Bilbao. Spain's King Juan Carlos said he would abdicate in favour of his son Prince Felipe, aiming to revive the scandal-hit monarchy at a time of economic hardship and growing discontent with the wider political elite

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

June 2014

A Palestinian man walks inside a crater made by an Israeli airstrike as others watch in Gaza City

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

June 2014

Smoke rises from a house days after part of the ground it was resting on collapsed into Lake Whitney, Texas

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

June 2014

Dancers of a group representing China perform at the annual Carnival of Cultures parade in Berlin

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

June 2014

An anti-government protester, covers himself with a shield during a protest against President Nicolas Maduro's government in Caracas

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

June 2014

Artists perform during the international D-Day commemoration ceremony in Ouistreham, in Normandy, marking the 70th anniversary of the World War II Allied landings in Normandy

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

July 2014

People cooling off in a waterpark in Suining, southwest China's Sichuan province

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

July 2014

A Palestinian woman pauses amid destroyed buildings in the northern district of Beit Hanun in the Gaza Strip during an humanitarian truce

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

July 2014

A man takes pictures of a sunken open-air parking lot after heavy rainfall hit Chengdu, Sichuan province. Four cars fell into the pit and one stuck on the edge as the ground sunk, according to local media

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

July 2014

Youths release white doves during a performance marking the 100th anniversary of the start of WWI during the military parade as part of the Bastille Day celebrations in Paris, France

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

July 2014

German national football team players cheer as they ride in an open-deck bus to Berlin's landmark Brandenburg Gate to celebrate their FIFA World Cup title

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

July 2014

Fabien Cousteau swims outside the marine laboratory Aquarius. Cousteau, grandson of famed French oceanographer Jacques Cousteau, emerged from the turquoise waters off the Florida Keys, marking the end of a record-breaking, 31-day stay in an underwater habitat with a team of scientists and documentary filmmakers

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

July 2014

Members of the Ukrainian State Emergency Service search for bodies in a field near the crash site of the Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17 near the village of Hrabove (Grabove), in Donetsk region

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

July 2014

Belarus' Catholics attend the annual celebration of Icon of the Mother of God in Budslav some 150 km north of Minsk. Thousands of Catholics come to Budslav as pilgrims to participate in prayer, confession and take part in a procession with candles, dedicated to the celebration of the anniversary Budslav Mother of God

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

August 2014

Visitors run away as waves caused by a tidal bore surge past a barrier on the banks of Qiantang River, in Hangzhou, Zhejiang province, China

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

August 2014

Displaced people from the minority Yazidi sect, fleeing violence from forces loyal to the Isis in Sinjar town, walk towards the Syrian border, on the outskirts of Sinjar mountain, near the Syrian border town of Elierbeh of Al-Hasakah Governorate

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

August 2014

Abass Yusuf holds in his mouth meat on a stick to feed a hyena in Harar, Ethiopia

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

August 2014

The moon rises in the sky as seen through the Four Towers or C.T.B.A. (Cuatro Torres Business Area), one of the main symbols of Madrid, Spain

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

August 2014

Would-be immigrants rest at Tarifa's harbour after being rescued off the Spanish Coast. Spain's coastguard rescued more than 200 sub-Saharan African migrants crossing the Strait of Gibraltar on small boats

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

August 2014

Newborn panda triplets inside an incubator at a safari park in the southern Chinese city of Guangzhou. Guangzhou's Chimelong Safari Park unveiled newborn panda triplets billed as the world's first surviving trio, in what it hailed as a "miracle" given the animal's famously low reproductive rate

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

September 2014

A Kurdish Peshmerga fighter launches mortar shells towards Zummar, which is controlled by the Islamic State, near Mosul

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

September 2014

Tourists have dinner as fish swim around them, at the Tianjin Haichang Polar Ocean World in Tianjin

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

September 2014

Sri Lankan dancers perform a traditional dance during a welcome ceremony following the arrival of Chinese President Xi Jinping at the Bandaranaike International Airport in Katunayake

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

September 2014

Fire as it approaches the shore of Bass Lake, California

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

September 2014

A mountaineer climbs up a ladder on Piz Beverin mountain (2998m) near Mathon above Val Schons in canton Grisons, Switzerland

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

September 2014

Geologists from the Hawaiian Volcano Observatory surveying the lava flow from the June 27th flow from the Kilauea volcano in Pahoa, Hawaii

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

September 2014

Chinese workers set up giant decoration flowers in preparations for National Day at Tiananmen Square in Beijing, China

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

September 2014

Protesters and student demonstrators hold up their cellphones in a display of solidarity during a protest outside the headquarters of Legislative Council in Hong Kong

XAUME OLLEROS/AFP/Getty Images

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

September 2014

Displaced South Sudanese women queue in knee-deep floodwaters to access fresh water originating from a borehole and stored in large bladders for them to access via a tap, at a makeshift camp for the displaced situated in the United Nations Mission in South Sudan (UNMISS) base in the town of Bentiu, South Sudan

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

September 2014

Vehicles on roads during rush hour on the eve of the National Day holidays in Shanghai

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

September 2014

A Syrian Kurdish girl looks at the Turkish police (unseen) as she crosses the border between Turkey and Syria near the southeastern town of Suruc in Sanliurfa province. Tens of thousands of Syrian Kurds flooded into Turkey, fleeing an onslaught by the jihadist Islamic State group that prompted an appeal for international intervention

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

September 2014

Mannequins dressed with fashion clothes are displayed against a container during a fashion bazaar held outside a shopping mall in Beijing

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

October 2014

A camel herder walks his camels at Pushkar Fair in the desert Indian state of Rajasthan

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

October 2014

Pro-democracy protesters open their umbrellas for 87 seconds, marking the 87 rounds of tear gas that were fired by the Hong Kong police at unarmed student protesters in exactly the same location one month ago, at the Admiralty protest zone which has been newly dubbed 'Umbrella Square', Admiralty, Hong Kong, China

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

October 2014

An explosion rocks Syrian city of Kobani during a reported suicide car bomb attack by the militants of Isis group on a People's Protection Unit (YPG) position in the city center of Kobani, as seen from the outskirts of Suruc, on the Turkey-Syria border

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

October 2014

Protesters pose with a police shield outside the parliament in Ouagadougou as cars and documents burn outside. Hundreds of angry demonstrators in Burkina Faso stormed parliament before setting it on fire in protest at plans to change the constitution to allow President Blaise Compaore to extend his 27-year rule

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

October 2014

A Palestinian boy practises his Parkour skills near the ruins of houses, which witnesses said were destroyed during a seven-week Israeli offensive, in the Shejaia neighborhood east of Gaza City

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

October 2014

A man walks past thousands of pink and blue flags an anti-abortion group placed on the front lawn of Parliament Hill as part of a campaign in Ottawa

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

October 2014

Mount Sinabung spews hot lava and volcanic ash as it is seen from Karo, North Sumatra, Indonesia

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

October 2014

A woman crawls towards the body of her sister as Ebola burial team members take her sister Mekie Nagbe (28) for cremation in Monrovia, Liberia

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

November 2014

Michael Brown's mother Leslie McSpadden (C) and other protesters react after hearing the grand jury decision in the fatal shooting of her son in Ferguson

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

November 2014

A young girl places a rose at the Berlin Wall memorial in Bernauer Strasse, during a ceremony marking the 25th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

November 2014

Grieving family members and friends of victims of the Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 disaster gathered around 298 candles representing the victims during a national commemoration ceremony in Amsterdam. Nearly four months after the Malaysia Airlines passenger jet was downed over eastern Ukraine killing all 298 people onboard, relatives and friends are gathering to commemorate the lives of victims

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

November 2014

Australia's Prime Minister Tony Abbott and US President Barack Obama as they meet 'Jimbelung' the Koala before the start of the first G20 meeting in Brisbane, Australia

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

December 2014

The Delta IV Heavy rocket with the Orion spacecraft lifts off from the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Cape Canaveral, Florida

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

December 2014

A girl stands in line in front of a bus with other passengers travelling to Nairobi, as they wait to be searched for weapons by Kenyan police, in the town of Mandera at the Kenya-Somalia border

Pictures of the year: World News 2014

December 2014

A man wearing a Christmas hat poses for photographer at a factory producing Christmas decorations in Yiwu, Zhejiang province, China

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