A member of the pro-Kremlin youth movement Stal wearing a Darth Vader mask participates in a rally in downtown Moscow. Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said Tuesday he's satisfied with the performance of his party in Russia's parliamentary election even though it lost a significant number of seats. (AP)

A cleaner wipes windows as passenger planes are parked on the tarmac shrouded by heavy fog at the Beijing Capital International Airport. Fog blanketed parts of northern China, forcing the airport to cancel dozens of departing flights. (AP)

An Indian Shiite Muslim mourns during a prayer to mark Ashura in New Delhi. Ashura is the 10th day of Muharram, the first month of the Islamic calendar, observed around the world in remembrance of the martyrdom of Imam Hussein, the grandson of Prophet Mohammed. (AP)

An officer participates in the raising ceremony of the national flag during celebrations of the 33rd anniversary of the Spanish constitution in Madrid. (AP)

Hungarian sculptor Erno Toth works on a wax model for a new bronze statue of late Apple co-founder Steve Jobs in Budapest. The statue was commissioned by chief of Hungarian software maker Graphisoft Gabor Bojar and will be delivered December 20. (Reuters)

A man carries an empty gas cylinder on his back after the ones distributed by the army ran out in Cairo. Butane gas cylinders have seen a surge in prices over the past weeks as a black market flourished due to the lack of security, according to local media. (Reuters)

A snake charmer performs at Galle Face Green in Colombo, Sri Lanka. (Reuters)

A woman displays placards during a protest against violence and against immunity for Yemen's outgoing President Ali Abdullah Saleh, in the southern city of Taiz. (Reuters)

A rose honoring Sonia Pelletier, a victim from the Montreal Massacre, is pictured during the National Day of Remembrance and Action on Violence Against Women rally on Parliament Hill in Ottawa.  On this day in 1989 14 female students at Montreal's Ecole Polytechnique were killed by a gunman.  (Reuters)

Dylan pulls Christmas trees from the forest to a customer's car at Dalby, near Pickering, northern England. The dog owners' charity Aqua Nova Bears are deploying their members' Newfoundland dogs, which can weigh up to 76 kg, to raise money for the Yorkshire air ambulance fund. (Reuters)

A fruit vendor takes a rest from selling pineapple at a public market in Quezon City Metro Manila. The Philippines' annual inflation rate slowed to 4.8 percent in November from 5.2 percent in October, below economists' forecasts. (Reuters)

A model presents a creation during the 2012 Korea Hair Collection in Seoul, South Korea. (Reuters)

A survivor of the Bhopal gas tragedy, the world's worst industrial disaster in India, dances on burning effigies of London Olympic organizing committee chairman Sebastian Coe and Indian Olympic Association's Vijay K. Malhotra to protest a sponsorship deal with Dow Chemicals for the 2012 Olympics, in Bhopal. (AP)

Shi'ite Muslims flagellate themselves during a Moharram procession ahead of Ashura in Jammu, India. (Reuters)

Protesters take snapshots of a mural picturing people with eye patches symbolizing protesters wounded in clashes with security forces near Tahrir Square in Cairo. (AP)

A pro-Syrian regime protester waves a national flag as he stands in front of huge portrait of President Bashar Assad during a protest against Arab and European sanctions in Damascus. (AP)

A masked Palestinian protester throws back a tear gas canister launched by Israeli troops during a demonstration against the expansion of the nearby Jewish settlement of Halamish in the West Bank village of Nabi Saleh near Ramallah. (AP)

Air Force officers are reflected in a puddle during a military ceremony celebrating the 92nd anniversary of Colombia's Air Force in Bogota, Colombia. (AP)

Indian currency notes are stapled to form a garland at a shop in Jammu. (Reuters)

Tomasz Sikora of Poland shoots during the World Cup biathlon men's 10 km sprint event in Ostersund, Sweden. (Reuters)

A man walks past a dog during a snowfall in a park in Beijing, China. (AFP)

The Elbe Sandstone Mountains, with Kleinhennersdorfer Stein mountain (L) Papstein mountain (C) and Gohrischstein mountain (R) near Koenigstein, eastern Germany is illuminated by the rising sun on Friday morning. (AP)

The sails of the Sydney Opera House turn red during a World Aids Day reception in Sydney, Australia. (Reuters)

Members of ruling party UMNO look on during the annual general assembly in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Delegates will meet for five days. (AFP)

A cleaner walks through the yard of the al-Azhar mosque of Cairo. The fundamentalist Brotherhood is emerging as the biggest winner in partial results from the first voting this week in Egypt's landmark election, in which voters turned out in unexpected droves. (AP)

A family walks past banners appealing to people to vote for the United Russia party in front of Moscow's Kremlin. Russians will vote in parliamentary elections on December 4.   (Reuters)

India's Naga tribe dancers in traditional attire during the inauguration of the Hornbill festival in Kisama village, on the outskirts of Kohima. The week-long festival, held annually to celebrate northeastern Nagaland's statehood day, concludes on Dec. 7. (AP)

Syrian refugees who fled violence in their country during a break in class at the Islamic Charity Center in Mafraq, Jordan. (Reuters)

People shop down the aisles of a recently opened supermarket in Mumbai. Tens of thousands of small shopkeepers went on strike across India Thursday to protest a government decision to allow foreign retail giants to enter the country's $450 billion retail market. (Reuters)

Austrian Caritas director Michael Landau (c) holds a sign promoting a donation campaign in front of a homeless shelter, The Crypt (Die Gruft), in Vienna. The  facility, run by Caritas, solicits donations from the public during the cold winter season. The sign reads: 'Crypt winter package, one sleeping bag, one hot meal'. (Reuters)

A member of the general trade union GMB stands outside The Houses of Parliament in London as public sector staff strike over pensions. Up to two million workers in Britain went on strike over changes to their pensions, after the government responded to slashed growth forecasts with fresh spending cuts. (AFP)

Nimrod plays on the swings at the Nyumbani Children's Home for children with HIV, in Karen on the outskirts of Nairobi, Kenya. The orphanage, which is heavily reliant on foreign donations, cares for over 100 children with HIV whose parents died of the disease and provides them with housing, care, and anti-retroviral medicine. (AP)

Retiring paramilitary policemen bid farewell to their comrades inside a train at a station in Dandong, Liaoning province, China. (Reuters)

People wave Vatican flags during a general audience with Pope Benedict XVI in the Paul VI hall at the Vatican. (AP)

A volunteer lines up 25-Centavo coins in an attempt to break the Guinness World Record currently being held by the U. S. at Rizal Park in Manila, Philippines. More than three million pieces are lined up for hours to stretch 70 kilometers to break the 64.8-kilometer record.  (AP)

Workers hold iron rods at the construction site of a bridge on the river Tawi in Jammu. India's economy grew at its weakest pace in more than two years in the quarter that ended in September, revealing the heavy toll that stubbornly high inflation, rising interest rates and crisis-hit global capital markets are having on Asia's third-biggest economy. (Reuters)

A ferret looks out of the jacket of an activist of the Frankfurt Occupy movement at the European Central Bank in Frankfurt, Germany. (AP)

A woman prepares snacks to sell near the railway line in Rangoon, Burma. (Reuters)

The sun rises above an Orthodox Church in the town of Novogrudok, 150 km west of the Belarussian capital Minsk. (Reuters)

Toyota Boshoku Corp.'s concept vehicle T-Brain is displayed during the press preview of the Tokyo Motor Show. The show opens to the public this weekend. (AP)

Primary school students present giant and small red ribbons during an event on the eve of World AIDS Day in Wuyuan, in southern China's Jiangxi province. China will have about 780,000 people infected with the AIDS virus by the end of this year, state media reported, with most having contracted it through heterosexual sex. (AP)

Lights on a tree are powered by people cycling and generating electricity that form part of exhibit for the climate change conference in Durban, South Africa. (AP)

Romanian volunteers hold hands forming a red ribbon, the anti-AIDS symbol, during an awareness rally in central Bucharest, two days before World AIDS Day. (Reuters)

Local residents watch supporters of South Ossetia's presidential hopeful Alla Dzhioyeva marching in Tskhinvali, the regional capital of Georgia's breakaway province.  Dzhioyeva, an anti-corruption crusader and ex-education minister, has danced before hundreds of supporters to claim victory over her Kremlin-anointed rival. (AP)

Argentina's David Nalbandian serves during a training session for the upcoming Davis Cup final in Seville. Argentina will play against Spain in the Davis Cup final, December 2-4. (Reuters)

A girl looks from inside a school as she waits for her parents to pick her up in the old part of Rangoon, Burma. U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton will test Burma's tentative democratic reforms this week in a high-stakes visit that could mark the Asian nation's return to the world stage after more than 50 years of political isolation. (Reuters)

A Kashmiri man rides a horse-drawn cart past a frost-covered field on the outskirts of Srinagar, India. (AP)

Seattle-based glass sculptor Dale Chihuly poses for a portrait with his work Mille Fiori at the new Halycon Gallery on New Bond Street in London. (Reuters)

A Pakistani Christian man beats his chest while taking part in an anti-American rally in Lahore to protest a weekend NATO cross-border attack that killed 24 Pakistani soldiers. (Reuters)

An Egyptian army soldier outside a polling station helps a woman to cast her vote during parliamentary elections in Alexandria. (Reuters)

Kosovo Serbs clash with German army soldiers serving in the NATO peacekeeping mission in Kosovo on a roadblock near the village of Jagnjenica. (AP)

Anti-nuclear protesters sit in a tent on the street near Gorleben, northern Germany, along the route of the so-called Castor transport. The train arrived at Dannenberg for unloading after leaving nuclear giant Areva's rail yard at Valognes, northwestern France on November 23, 2011 and negotiating  obstacles set by anti-nuclear activists.  The train is due to unload its cargo of  nuclear waste onto trucks to continue the final leg of the journey to the Gorleben storage facility on the River Elbe. (AFP)

A man rides his bicycle near Augsburg, southern Germany. (AP)

A visitor takes a photograph in the Monument Gallery room of the Scottish National Portrait Gallery in Edinburgh, Scotland. The gallery is open to the public after a two and a half year year 17.6 million pounds ($27.4 million) restoration project. (Reuters)

An cricket team supporter waves his county's flag prior to the first one-day international cricket match against West Indies in Cuttack, India. (AP)

A newborn, endangered Eld's deer fawn stands in a cage at Khao Kheow Open Zoo in Chonburi province, east of Bangkok, Thailand. (Reuters)

A dove has a flag of Yemen and a badge of President Ali Abdullah Saleh attached to its body at a rally during Friday prayers in Sanaa. (Reuters)

Masked members of Iran's Basij militia attend a military parade to mark Basij week in front of the former U.S. embassy in Tehran. (Reuters)

A woman takes a break from shopping on Black Friday at Dadeland Mall in Miami, Florida. (AP)

A Thai flood victim sits under a mosquito at a relief center in Bangkok. (AP)

Cross country skiers use an artificial snow track in the western Austrian village of Seefeld. (Reuters)

Rachael Flatt of the U.S. performs during the ladies short program at the ISU Grand Prix of Figure Skating Rostelecom Cup in Moscow, Russia. (Reuters)

A Christie's auction house worker poses for photographers sitting in front of a 1887 painting by Vasily Vereshchagin, entitled ''Crucifixion by the Romans' in London, Britain. The painting will be part of Christie's Russian Art Sale on November 28, 2011. (AP)

The Snoopy the Flying Ace balloon floats down Central Park West during the 85th Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade in New York City. (Reuters)

Indian Sikh schoolgirls laugh during a religious procession in New Delhi. The procession was held to mark the martyrdom of Guru Tegh Bahadur, the ninth Sikh guru, who was executed in 1675 in Delhi. (AP)

A young man stops by the closed the gate of a subway station in Lisbon, during a general strike as trade unions protest austerity measures linked to a euro78 billion international bailout. The subway is to close all day while government offices, school classes, mail deliveries, trash collection and other public services are likely to be severely affected. (AP)

A woman walks past electoral paintings representing political parties in Casablanca. Moroccans head to polls to elect a new parliament Friday after the king brought forward elections in response to Arab Spring demonstrations over the past nine months. (AP)

U.S. Army soldiers serve Thanksgiving meals to their comrades in Forward Operating Base (FOB) Shank in Logar province, eastern Afghanistan. (Reuters)

Workers attach an election poster featuring Russia's President Dmitry Medvedev (R) and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, appealing to people to vote for the United Russia political party, onto an office building in the southern city of Krasnodar. Russians will vote in parliamentary elections December 4. (Reuters)

A Pakistani boy is reflected in a street barber's mirror while having a haircut, in a slum on the outskirts of Islamabad, Pakistan. (AP)

The Hawaii All-State Marching Band make its way through Times Square during the 85th Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade in New York City. (Reuters)

Supporters of Bharatiya Mazdoor Sangh, or Indian Workers Group, participate in a protest rally in New Delhi. The supporters demanded that the government protect workers rights in the ongoing economic reform process as well as the financial crisis. (AP)

A boy joins journalists and students in lighting candles on the pavement near the Presidential Palace in Manila to mark the second anniversary of the massacre of at least 57 people, including 32 journalists and staff, in Maguindanao province in southern Philippines. (AP)

A worker carries bricks by balancing them on the head at a brick factory in Bhaktapur, Nepal. (Reuters)

A boy with a face mask stands with his father in Cairo's Tahrir Square as clashes take place nearby with Egyptian riot police. Police are clashing with anti-government protesters for a fifth day. (AP)

Riot police officers secure the railway tracks in Lieusaint, Normandy, France, as environmental activists try to block the tracks in an effort to stop a train loaded with nuclear waste headed for Gorleben, Germany. (AP)

Andalusian horsemen wait with horses before competing in a contest during the Sicab International P.R.E. Horse Fair in Seville, Spain. The show runs till November 27 and is dedicated exclusively to Spanish thoroughbreds. (Reuters)

Residents watch a bushfire from the top of their cars in Margaret River, Western Australia. At least 20 homes have been destroyed by the fire according to local authorities. (Reuters)

Pigeons fly next to the Georges Pompidou art center, left, in Paris. (AP)

A man pays silent tribute in front of sculptures of two dead marines during a memorial service on Yeonpyeong Island, South Korea. South Korea marked the first anniversary of North Korea's deadly artillery attack on the front-line island Wednesday. (AP)

Vehicles at a Honda auto factory are submerged in floodwaters at the Rojana industrial district in Ayutthaya, central Thailand. The factory remains closed because of the flooding. (AP)

A boy controls his kite in Dhaka, Bangladesh. (Reuters)