One World Trade Center stands in construction in New York as the first of 18 segments of a spire crowning it was hoisted into place. At 104 -storeys, it is the highest building in New York and when the 408-foot spire is complete, it will become the tallest in the western hemisphere. (AFP)
Indian students light candles to pay tribute to legendary Indian sitar player Ravi Shankar in Varanasi, where he was born. Shankar, who is credited with connecting the world to Indian music, died Tuesday in San Diego at the age of 92. (AP)
Workers walk past clocks showing a time of 12 minutes past 12 noon, on this century’s last sequential date, in the Canary Wharf business district of London, England. (Reuters)
Joseph Villanueva, 18-months, is dressed in Mexican indigenous clothing during a celebration of the Virgin of Guadalupe’s feast day at Our Lady of Fatima Church in Passaic, N.J. Catholic Mexicans in New Jersey pay homage to the Virgin on December 12 to observe what they believe was an apparition of the Virgin seen on the hill of Tepeyac in Mexico City on December 12, 1531. (AP)
A Syrian boy stands between men as they wait outside a bakery shop to buy bread in Maaret Misreen, near Idlib. (AP)
Ukrainian parliament members scuffle over regulations during the first session of the newly-elected parliament in Kiev. (Reuters)
Typhoon victims transport construction materials to rebuild houses past a destroyed banana plantation in New Bataan, southern Philippines. Typhoon Bopha killed 647 people and caused crop damage worth $210 million. (Reuters)
Matryoshkas, traditional Russian wooden dolls, are displayed for sale on a cold winter day in Sparrow Hills, a tourist attraction in Moscow, Russia. (AP)
Deer graze in the frozen undergrowth of Richmond Park in west London, England. (Reuters)
Fans of Brazil’s Corinthians cheer their team on before their Club World Cup semi-final soccer match against Egypt’s Al-Ahly in Toyota, Japan, which ended with a 1-0 victory for the Brazilian team. (Reuters)
A lion holds a Christmas gift during a photocall marking Christmas at the London Zoo in London, England. (AFP)
