Year in Review: Top News Photos of 2012
1. Malala Yousufzai is seen with her father Ziauddin and her two younger brothers Khushal Khan and Atal Khan (R), as she recuperates at the The Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Birmingham, in this photograph taken October 25, 2012 and released October 26, 2012. The father of a Pakistani girl who was shot in the head by the the Taliban for advocating girls’ education said on Friday his daughter was strong and would “rise again” to pursue her dreams after receiving treatment in a British hospital.
2. Tibetan exile Jamphel Yeshi, 27, runs as he is engulfed in flames after he set himself on fire during a protest in New Delhi on March 26, 2012. A Tibetan exile set himself on fire on Monday during a rally in New Delhi to protest against an upcoming visit to India by Chinese President Hu Jintao, police said.
3. A fully grown male wild leopard climbs a net after it fell into a water reservoir tank at a tea estate in Haskhowa, some 45 kms from Siliguri, on June 20, 2012. The animal was rescued by the Sukna Forest rescue team from the Mahananda Wildlife sanctuary by lowering a ladder and a net into the tank.
4. The mother of 10-month-old Palestinian girl, Hanen Tafesh, killed the day before in an Israeli air strike, is comforted by her husband and relatives as she mourns before her funeral in Gaza City, on November 16, 2012. Israeli warplanes carried out multiple new air strikes on the Palestinian territory, including several hits on Gaza City, the third day of an intensive campaign which the military has said is aimed at stamping out rocket fire on southern Israel.
5. Two Syrian rebels take sniper positions at the heavily contested neighborhood of Karmal Jabl in central Aleppo on October 18, 2012. Violence persisted on October 19 with rebels and loyalists of President Bashar al-Assad locked in battle for the northwestern town of Maaret al-Numan on the Damascus-Aleppo highway linking Syria’s two biggest cities.
6. A protester reacts as the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi is seen in flames during a protest by an armed group said to have been protesting a film being produced in the United States September 11, 2012. An American staff member of the U.S. consulate in the eastern Libyan city of Benghazi has died following fierce clashes at the compound, Libyan security sources said on Wednesday. Armed gunmen attacked the compound on Tuesday evening, clashing with Libyan security forces before the latter withdrew as they came under heavy fire.
7. South Korean pop sensation Psy, whose real name is Park Jae-Sang, performs for fans at a promotion by the Sunrise breakfast television show in central Sydney on October 17, 2012. The 34-year-old Psy has rocketed to international fame with his song “Gangnam Style” and its much-imitated dance moves which has gone viral on YouTube.
8. Rescuers and relatives stop a woman from committing suicide by jumping off a building in Zhanjiang, Guangdong province August 14, 2012. The woman was rescued as she tried to commit suicide after killing her nephew following a family dispute, local media reported. Picture taken August 14, 2012.
9. In this photograph taken on July 10, 2012, a Pakistani worker pulls on a wire he will connect to a thick chain that will in turn be used to peel away a slab of the outer structure of a beached vessel in one of the 127 ship-breaking plots in Geddani, some 40Kms west of Karachi. Geddani’s ship-breaking yards employ some 10,000 workers including welders, cleaners, crane operators and worker supervisors. The yards are one of the largest ship-breaking operations in the world rivaling in size those located in India and Bangladesh. It takes 50 workers about three months to break down a midsize average transport sea vessel of about 40,000 tonnes. The multimillion-dollar ship-breaking industry contributes significantly to the national supply of steel to Pakistani industries. For a six-day working week of hard and often dangerous work handling asbestos, heavy metals and polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), employees get paid about 300 USD a month of which half is spent on food and rent for run-down rickety shacks near the yards, a labour representative told AFP.
10. Severely malnourished two-year-old girl Rajni is weighed by health workers at the Nutritional Rehabilitation Centre of Shivpuri district in the central Indian state of Madhya Pradesh February 1, 2012. India has failed to reduce its high prevalence of child malnutrition despite its economy doubling between 1990 and 2005 to become Asia’s third largest. A government-supported survey last month said 42 percent of children under five are underweight – almost double that of sub-Saharan Africa – compared to 43 percent five years ago. The statistic – which means 3,000 children dying daily due to illnesses related to poor diets – forced Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to admit last month that malnutrition was “a national shame” and was putting the health of the nation in jeopardy.
11. A Dutch local resident, standing in his house, looks to high waters level through his window, in Dordrecht on January 5, 2012. Gale force winds reaching up to 110 kilometres (about 70 miles) an hour as well as heavy rains are expected along the Dutch coast. About a quarter of the country sits below sea level.
12. Fireworks explode above Tower Bridge in London on July 27, 2012, to celebrate the opening of the London 2012 Olympic Games.
13. A demonstrator holds a traffic sign during clashes between protesters and riot police near the Greek parliament in Athens on February 12, 2012. Greek police fired tear gas at petrol bomb-throwing protesters outside parliament, where tens of thousands had massed in a rally against austerity plans being debated by lawmakers.
14. A crowd watches an F/A-18 Hornet fighter aircraft of the Swiss Air Force on October 11, 2012 doing a flight demonstration of the Swiss Air Force over Axalp in the Bernese Oberland.
15. The Soyuz TMA-05M spacecraft is seen shortly after it landed with the International Space Station (ISS) crew of Japanese astronaut Akihiko Hoshide, Russian cosmonaut Yuri Malenchenko and U.S. astronaut Sunita Williams near the town of Arkalyk in northern Kazakhstan November 19, 2012.
16. Jake Beaudoin, a U.S. Army Private of 508 BSTB, 4th Brigade Combat Team, 82nd Airborne Division, takes cover during a controlled detonation to clear an area for setting up a check point in Zahri district of Kandahar province, southern Afghanistan May 31, 2012.
17. A nun films as Pope Benedict XVI leads his weekly audience in Saint Peter’s Square at the Vatican May 2, 2012.
18. A woman holds her malnourished child at a therapeutic feeding center at al-Sabyeen hospital in Sanaa May 28, 2012.
19. A topless man smashes the windshield of a taxi in the middle of a street in Hefei, Anhui province July 17, 2012. The man ran onto a busy street on Tuesday morning wearing only a pair of shorts, climbing onto cars and smashing windows with his bare fists. He was taken away to the hospital by policeman and doctors after smashing nearly 20 vehicles in half an hour. Police said there was no identification with the man, and he would go through psychiatric examination to determine whether he was mentally ill, local media reported.
20. Firefighters of Alcoy and Elda try to extinguish a fire in Torre de Macanes near Alicante, on August 13, 2012. One person was killed and three injured Sunday as firefighters battled wildfires across Spain, authorities said, the latest victims in a sweltering summer of forest blazes.
