Pictures of the year - October
Blood trickles down a man’s tattooed torso during Phuket's annual vegetarian festival, a celebration involving strict vegetarianism, spirit mediums and objects being pushed through devotees' pierced flesh.
The picture is one of many striking shots captured by Reuters photographers in October 2013 as they covered a wide array of stories, from life in Somalia’s battle-scarred capital to the troubled career of Toronto mayor Rob Ford.
A tourist poses for a picture on a bridge at the Ebrington Square area of Derry City, the United Kingdom's 2013 City of Culture.
Belgian riot police stand covered in foam, sprayed towards them by firefighters who were protesting for better working conditions.
Afghan boys play with toy guns on the first day of the Muslim holiday of Eid al-Adha.
An armed man from the native Turkana community of northwestern Kenya walks towards the shores of Lake Turkana near the border with Ethiopia. A scarcity of fish and pastureland in the area is fuelling old conflict with the Ethiopian indigenous Dhaasanac.
A resident looks out of the window of his family home, which toppled into a river following an earthquake in central Philippines.
An elderly man walks out of a polling station in Abyei, a remote and disputed border region between Sudan and South Sudan. The area’s permanent residents held a vote on which of the two Sudans they should join, despite warnings it could trigger violence in the volatile area.
Toronto Mayor Rob Ford speaks to members of the media on the day that police said they had obtained a video "consistent" with accounts that it showed him smoking crack cocaine. The Toronto Mayor later admitted he had smoked crack but insisted he was not an addict and would stay in office.
Sashka Ruseva, a Bulgarian Roma woman, holds her two-year-old son Atanas as she speaks to the media outside her home. DNA tests showed that Ruseva and her husband were the parents of a four-year-old blonde girl who was found in Greece living with another Roma couple who were not related to her. The girl’s discovery sparked a global search for her real parents.
Pakistani teenage activist Malala Yousafzai, who was shot in the head by the Taliban for campaigning for girls' education, signs a copy of her book before an event launching her memoir, "I Am Malala".
A woman sits on her suitcase during a 24-hour train strike against plans to privatise Spanish public railway companies Adif and Renfe.
