Slovenia’s Jakov Fak, center, competes in men 15 km mass start race at the Biathlon World Cup in Pokljuka, Slovenia. Fak placed second. (AP)

Protesters are seen through a shape of a heart on a banner as they shout slogans during a demonstration against regional government-imposed austerity plans to restructure and part-privatize the health care sector in Madrid, Spain. (AP)

Cali Xoosh Mohamed, a Quran teacher from the Sufi Ahlu Sunna faction, teaches his students while armed with an AK-47 assault rifle at a madrasa, or Quranic school, in Dhusamareeb, central Somalia. Cali said he is armed with a weapon at all times for self-defense after losing a close friend and some of his students in battles against fighters from Somalia’s al Shabaab rebel militant group. (Reuters)

Participants are hit by colored powder during the ‘The Color Run’ in Rio de Janeiro, Bazil. The Color Run is a 5-km race where runners are hit with a powder of different colors at each kilometer they pass. (Reuters)

Worshipers at Bethlehem’s Church of the Nativity in West Bank hold a special prayer for Venezuela’ s president Hugo Chavez. Chavez, who is recovering from cancer surgery in Cuba, is an outspoken critic of Israel and supporter of Palestinian independence. (AP)

Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda of the ruling Democratic Party bows at a press conference in Tokyo after announcing his resignation as the party chief to take responsibility for the party’s loss in parliamentary elections. (AP)

Fog partially covers the Dolomite mountains before the Men’s World Cup Giant Slalom in Alta Badia, Italy. (AFP)

The carcass of the humpback whale Johannes, which was stranded on a sandbank near the Wadden Sea island of Texel on December 12, 2012, remains on the beach in Den Helder, the Netherlands. (AFP)

Christmas decorations made of cartridges are pictured inside a garage of the German Bundeswehr armed forces camp Marmal, near Mazar-e-Sharif, northern Afghanistan, December 15, 2012. (Reuters)