World News in Pictures

[Mr Lick]

Members of the public and human rights organizations watch on a giant screen outside court as sentences are handed down to two former Argentine dictators for their involvement in the kidnapping of babies from leftist activists killed during the 1976-1983 dictatorship, in Buenos Aires on July 5, 2012.






A woman waits for the verdict.




From Buenos Aires, Argentina — Three key figures from Argentina's "Dirty War" got hefty jail terms for the systematic theft of babies from political prisoners during the 1976-1983 dictatorship, an Argentine court ruled on Thursday.

The trial featured gut-wrenching testimony from grandmothers and other relatives who searched inconsolably for their missing relatives, and from people who learned as young adults that they were raised by the very people involved in the disappearance of their birth parents

[Mr Lick]

NBCSanDiego.com reports: A computer glitch apparently caused the fireworks mishap that disappointed thousands of people who camped out to watch the Big Bay Boom in San Diego's Glorietta Bay Wednesday night, when they got more of a Big Bay Bust.

Hours after the fireworks malfunction, August Santore, co-owner of Garden State Fireworks, told San Diego morning television stations, “We apologize to all the residents and all the people who missed their fireworks.”

[Mr Lick]

Waterproof poncho-sellers model their own merchandise in uber-wet conditions during practice for the British Grand Prix at the Silverstone Circuit. Some areas of the UK are bracing themselves for a month's rainfall over the next 24 hours



In this very sweet video grab the female giant panda Shin Shin cuddles her newly born baby in her cage at Ueno Zoo in Tokyo. All together now: Aaaaaaaah

[Mr Lick]

It's that time of year again as thousands await the opening ceremony of the San Fermin festival, famous the world over for the running of the bulls



A member of the 'I am 132' movement wears a mask of Mexiccan presidential frontrunner Enrique Peña Nieto during a demonstration demanding transparency in election results. A recount on Thursday showed Peña Nieto as the clear winner of Sunday's presidential election, but the runner-up still refuses to concede, alleging Peña Nieto's party bought millions of votes



Valletta, Malta: An immigrant waves from a police bus after the army rescued 84 Somali immigrants when their rubber dinghy started taking on water en route to Europe from Africa

[Mr Lick]

Colorado, US: Kate Stefani tries to salvage anything she can from her home in the Mountain Shadows after her home was destroyed in the Waldo Canyon fire, which has burned about 28 square miles and damaged or destroyed almost 350 homes



Pamplona, Spain: Members of the pro-animal group Peta stage a protest against bullfighting with their bodies covered in paint in front of the Town Hall ahead of the San Fermin running of the bulls festival

[Mr Lick]

Rouen, France: A young fan sits on an exercise bike on the roof of a Volkswagen campervan as she waits for riders during the fifth stage of the Tour de France cycle race starting in Rouen and finishing in Saint-Quentin



A demonstrator is arrested by riot policemen during a protest held by Chile's Union workers at Santiago downtown, July 5, 2012. The protest was held to demand an increase in their minimum salary, according to local media.

[Mr Lick]

A resident cast his net while standing on a fence partially submerged by the overflowing Yangtze River in Chongqing municipality, China, July 5, 2012. Floods triggered by strong rainfall that has been battering many parts of China since June 20 have left 50 people dead and 42 missing. According to the Ministry of Civil Affairs, more than 10.4 million people have been affected by downpours in 399 counties in Inner Mongolia, Zhejiang, Fujian, Jiangxi, Hubei, Hunan, Guangdong, Guangxi, Chongqing, Sichuan and Guizhou, Xinhua News Agency reported.



A riot police officer uses pepper spray on Amazonian indigenous demonstrators in La Paz July 5, 2012. The indigenous people of the territory of national park Isiboro Secure, known by its Spanish acronym TIPNIS, remain in La Paz after walking 640 km (397 miles) to defend their territory against the planned construction of a highway through the middle of the park



Sayeed Zabiuddin Ansari (C, face covered) is escorted to a court in New Delhi July 5, 2012. Indian police arrested Ansari at Delhi airport on June 21, accusing him of helping coordinate the Mumbai attack by 10 gunmen of Pakistan's Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) militant group from a "control room" in the Pakistani city of Karachi.



A piece of the wreckage of Turkish F-4 jet which was shot down by Syria and retrieved from the seabed on Thursday, is seen in this undated, picture taken underwater and released by Turkish Chief of Staff July 5, 2012. Turkey's armed forces command said on Thursday it had retrieved the bodies of two pilots of a jet shot down by Syria last month, recovering them from the seabed 8.6 nautical miles from the Syrian coast.

[Mr Lick]

Peruvian police block the way for people carrying coffins of three demonstrators who died during protests against the Conga mining project in Celendin, Cajamarca, Peru on July 6, 2012. The death toll from clashes between security forces and demonstrators fighting a planned $4.8 billion gold mine by U.S.-based Newmont in northern Peru has climbed to five, medical officials said.

[Mr Lick]

The traditional Slavic festival of Kupala Night celebrates the summer solstice with overnight festivities. Kupala is celebrated in Ukraine, Belarus, Poland and Russia on the Gregorian calendar of June 23 or 24. People sing and dance before jumping over campfires believed to purge sins and improve health.

[Mr Lick]

The bright star U Camelopardalis, or U Cam for short, is surrounded by a tenuous shell of gas in an image from the Hubble Space Telescope.

The flash of an earthly fireworks display can be over in an instant — sometimes literally — but the show is longer lasting in outer space. The dying red-giant star known as U Camelopardalis, 1,500 light-years away in a region of sky near the north celestial pole, is in the midst of a fireworks blast that lasts for centuries.


By human standards, U Cam's blast may seem like an eternity. The star's shining shell of glowing gas, documented in this picture from the Hubble Space Telescope, has been traveling outward for something like 700 years, as Bad Astronomy's Phil Plait points out. When the outward explosion began, Europe was suffering through famines and plagues, and the mainstream view was that our planet was the center of the universe.

But in the astronomical scheme of things, centuries are mere blinks of the eye — and it won't be long before U Cam gives up the ghost.



The Flame Nebula flares in this color-coded view from NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer. The famous Horsehead Nebula can be seenas a small bump poking out from the edge of the cloud, below the bright star of the flame.

The star-forming nebula is situated about as far away from us as U Cam — but in the direction of the constellation Orion, near the celestial equator. NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer captured this view of the vast cloud and dust, lit up by a bright star that's 20 times as massive as our sun.

This view also shows two other familiar nebulae. The knot of light just beneath the brightest part of the image is a nebula known as NGC 2023. The Horsehead Nebula is poking out from the greenish-colored cloud, just to the right of NGC 2023 and down a bit. In visible light, the Horsehead is a dark cloud silhouetted by glowing gas, but in infrared light, we see the glow of the cloud instead

[Mr Lick]

Riders try and get back on their bicycles after crashing at some 15.5 miles from the finnish line during the sixth stage of the Tour de France on July 6.



Netherlands' Wouter Poels is pictured after the crash of approximately 30 riders 15.5 miles from the finish of the sixth stage of the Tour de France on July 6.






Injured Thomas Danielson of the U.S. sits in the grass after a crash near the finish of the sixth stage of the Tour de France



Johan van Summeren of Belgium is helped by a team member after crashing during the sixth stage of the Tour de France

[Mr Lick]

What makes a good photograph? That's the question at the heart of the Foto8 Summershow, a self-styled Salon de photographie opening on Friday evening in London.




Mum and kid. From a series looking at the lives of a community in Tallaght, Ireland.





Central Highlands, Papua New Guinea.



An Occupy Wall Street protester meditates in Zuccotti park after the movement was evicted by NYPD the prior evening.



Untitled, from the series 'We Make The Path By Walking', which deals with the subject of long distance walking as a means of meditation and personal transformation, and aims to immerse the viewer in a fictional journey which evokes this subtle internal progress and change.



Tuxedo Pee Break. Toilet break during a formal student initiation in the garden of a student flat in Dunedin, New Zealand



The Libyan Wish. A Libyan fighter sits on a rocket launcher mounted on a pickup truck outside the walls of Sirte. The Battle of Sirte was the toughest fighting of the Libyan war.



Untitled, from the series '4,480 KwH'. Ferrybridge power station, West Yorkshire.



Mojo, 2011. From the series 'To a Place I can't Pronounce'

[Mr Lick]

Thousands of people celebrate the start of the San Fermin Festival 2012 raising their red scarfs after the opening ceremony 'Chupinazo,' which starts, as every year, at midday in the Plaza Consistorial outside the City Hall in Pamplona, Navarra, Spain, on July 6. The fiesta of Sanfermines runs from 06 to 14 July. The festival commemorates St. Fermin, Pamplona's patron saint.



Participants gather to celebrate the 'Chupinazo' to mark the start at noon sharp of the San Fermin Festival on July 6, in front of the Town Hall of Pamplona, northern Spain. Tens of thousands of people packed Pamplona's streets for a drunken kick-off to Spain's best-known fiesta: the nine-day San Fermin bull-running festival.



Australian revelers enjoy as they drink from a small wineskin, in Pamplona, northern Spain, on July 6, to celebrate the start of Spain's most famous bull-running festival with the annual launch of the "chupinazo" rocket. Perhaps best glorified by Ernest Hemingway's 1926 novel "The Sun Also Rises," the San Fermin festival is known around the world for the daily running of the bulls.

[Mr Lick]

A protester shouts slogans during an anti nuclear rally near Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda's official residence, in Tokyo, Japan, on July 6. Despite the rain, tens of thousands of people gathered around the prime minister's office and the Diet to protest against the restart of reactors at the Oi nuclear power plant.




Japan ended two months without nuclear power on Thursday when the No. 3 unit at Kansai Electric Power Co's Ohi plant became the first reactor to resume supplying electricity to the grid since a nationwide safety shutdown after the Fukushima disaster.

Japan's last working reactor was idled in early May, leaving the country without nuclear power for the first time since 1970.

[Mr Lick]

Wimbledon 2012: the men's semi-finals

The best images of Andy Murray v Jo Wilfried Tsonga and Roger Federer v Novak Djokovic



It's raining in London as the crowds enter Wimbledon at 10.30am



The roof is closed, allowing play to go ahead



Federer sweeps through the first set, winning it 6-3



Djokovic replies, winning the second set 6-3 to square up the match



Djokovic, who has won six of their past seven meetings, eventually concedes what feels like a critical third set (6-4) after an epic rally



Kylie Minogue is among the spectators in the Royal Box.

Think she was just about to break into one of her classics ''I should be so lucky'' when she discovered that the great Rod Laver was sitting close by.



Federer set the pace again in the fourth set, breaking his opponent to move three games to love clear



Victory is eventually his in 2hrs and 19 mins as he claims the fourth set 6-3. Now, who will Federer face in the final ... Murray or Tsonga?

[Mr Lick]

Murray is imperious in the first two sets and streaks to what appears an unassailable lead 6-3, 6-4



But Tsonga isn't giving in that easily. He rallies at the start of the third set and takes a three-love lead



... pushing Murray around the court with renewed belief and duly pulling back a set



Tsonga takes a blow to his nether regions as the pair engage in an increasingly thrilling battle



The fourth set is tight initially. Here, Murray passes Tsonga and leaves his opponent on the turf



Break points are saved by both men. Desperate stuff



Leading 6-5, Murray earns two match points on Tsonga's serve and seals victory with a stunning cross-court forehand ...



But hold on, maybe it's not all over. The line-judge has apparently called it out, and Tsonga, who already had his racket in the air ready to appeal, may be reprieved



Despite the importance of the decision, both men meet at the net and raise a wry smile. Murray challenges the line-judge's call and so it's time for Hawk-eye to determine the facts ...



It was in! Murray is through to his first Wimbledon grand final - and becomes the first British male since Fred Perry in 1938 to achieve that feat. Tears are in his eyes. He looks overwhelmed



The pair embrace after a wonderful contest



As Murray leaves the court he still looks unable to comprehend the victory



He'll need a good day's rest before facing Federer in the final on Sunday. He's never before beaten the Swiss in a Grand Slam match. But if he succeeds this time, he'll win his first major title

[Mr Lick]

Manchester's new National Football Museum

There are over 2,500 exhibits on display at the new National Football Museum, which opened in Manchester today (plus a staggering 140,000 in the museum archive). From artwork to hundreds of shirts worn by famous players and an interactive penalty shoot-out zone, it claims to hold "the world's finest collection of football artefacts and archives". Here's a taster of some of the highlights



The highlight of the museum's collection is probably this now rather scruffy Argentina shirt worn by Diego Maradona in the quarter-final of the 1986 Mexico World Cup against England. His infamous "hand of God" goal broke the nation's heart.



The Art of The Game, a painting of Eric Cantona by Michael Browne. The renaissance style painting illustrates the resurrection of Cantona's career following his kung fu kick on a spectator in the stands during a match.



A replica of the Jules Rimet World Cup trophy is one of the museum's star items. This is the version that was presented to England in 1966. Months before the tournament the trophy was stolen from an exhibition in London. It was found by Pickles the dog in Norwood, south London, but the FA didn't want to risk losing it again and the Queen presented the replica to the winners. This is the only surviving version as the original was stolen again, this time from the Brazilian football association's headquarters, and never found.



The ball from the 1966 final is another big draw. Here's England's Geoff Hurst smashing it home for the fourth goal in England's 4-2 win over West Germany, probably the most replayed in English football history. The accompanying BBC commentary by Kenneth Wolstenholme – "They think it's all over" – has entered the language



Paul Gascoigne's Spitting Image puppet was often seen in floods of tears, a parody of this moment after England's defeat in the semi-final of the 1990 World Cup … against West Germany … on penalties, of course.



For the 1970 World Cup England wore ventilated Airtex shirts to help counter the sweltering heat of Mexico. After losing their group game 1-0 to Brazil, captain Bobby Moore swapeed his with Pelé



Blackpool shirt won by Sir Stanley Matthews, and chaired by team-mates after winning the famous 1953 FA Cup Final at Wembley against Bolton Wanderers



The Urbis Centre in central Manchester, home of the museum

[Mr Lick]

Torrential rain in the UK

British weather forecasters predict 24 hours of very wet weather with almost a month's worth of rain expected across much of the UK, prompting flood warnings and fears of widespread disruption












The Prince of Wales speaks with a local resident equipped for the worst in Hebden Bridge, West Yorkshire, an area badly affected by the floods that hit parts of West Yorkshire last week

[OhOh]

[Mr Lick]

A general view of Estafeta street crowded with runners or 'mozos', prior to the first bull run of the Sanfermines 2012 in Pamplona, northern Spain, July 7. Sanfermines is a week-long festival celebrated to honor San Fermin, the town's patron saint.



Look at me mum, aren't i brave?



Plenty of targets to pick from there Mr Bull



He's selected the guy in the green shirt



A much more sensible sport

[Mr Lick]

Women wave to a helicopter during the National Assembly election at a polling station in Tripoli July 7. Libyans queued to vote in their first free national election in 60 years on Saturday, to choose a 200-member assembly.



Libyan men hold their elections ID cards celebrating election day in Tripoli, Libya, Saturday, July 7. Jubilant Libyan voters marked a major step toward democracy after decades of erratic one-man rule, casting their ballots Saturday in the first parliamentary election after last year's overthrow and killing of longtime leader Moammar Gadhafi. But the joy was tempered by boycott calls, the burning of ballots and other violence in the country's restive east.

[Mr Lick]

Welland Tribune reports: Despite the searing heat, wirewalker Jay Cochrane was the epitome of cool on Friday as he made the first of an estimated 81 death-defying walks between the Skylon Tower and Hilton Fallsview Hotel.

Dressed in a blue jumpsuit and a turtleneck, the 68-year-old Sudbury native started his 340-metre tightrope walk from the Skylon Tower shortly after 7 p.m. Friday. Approximately 30 minutes later, a smiling Cochrane, known as Canada's Prince of Air, arrived at the north tower of the hotel.

"Yes, it was difficult but if it was easy everyone would do it," Cochrane joked after his historic walk.

[Mr Lick]

Jiyuan, China: A paramilitary guard watches giant gushes of water being released from the Xiaolangdi dam to clear up the sediment-laden Yellow river



Malaga, Spain: Protesters chain themselves to block the door of the building of Maria Jose Lopez and her husband Salvador's flat, before they were evicted after failing to pay their mortgage



Brides speak to their grooms during a mass wedding ceremony in Amman July 6, 2012. An Islamic charity organized a mass wedding for 46 Jordanian and Syrian couples who are unable to afford expensive ceremonies.



Gymnasts from the Nanjing children's gymnastic team stretch during a training session at a sports centre in Nanjing, Jiangsu province, July 6, 2012.

[Mr Lick]

A coal miner kicks a gas canister during clashes with the Spanish riot civil guard at the Pozo Santiago coal mine in Aller, in northern Spain, July 6, 2012. The coal miners are protesting against the government's proposal to decrease funding for coal production. Picture taken July 6.



A riot police vehicle sprays water at an Amazonian indigenous demonstrator in La Paz, July 6, 2012. The indigenous people of the territory of Isiboro Secure national park, known by its Spanish acronym TIPNIS, remain in La Paz after walking 640 km (398 miles) to defend their territory against the planned construction of a highway through the middle of the national park.



Buddhist monks walk in lines past people who have gathered for a mass alms-offering ceremony at Bangkok's shopping district July 7, 2012. The ceremony was held to mark 2,600th anniversary of the enlightenment of Lord Buddha.



U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton reacts during a joint news conference in Kabul July 7, 2012. The United States has named Afghanistan a major non-NATO ally, Clinton said on Saturday, a move that could reinforce Washington's message to Afghans that they will not be abandoned as the war winds down.

[Mr Lick]

UK gets a soaking - more pics