The bomb damaged area of the City of London is seen in this April 24, 1993 file photo after two blasts ripped through a few of the the buildings in the area. Dozens of poeple were injured in the blast. Photo by Andre

Hundreds of Soviet patrons queue outside Moscow’s first McDonald’s restaurant which opened here January 31, 1990. The restaurant has a capacity of 15,000 meals a day and is the biggest ever built by the fast-food chain. Photo by Corbis

Chief Executive of communications company NTL, Barclay Knapp poses with a laptop computer advertising the launch date of NTL’s free internet access, March 7. NTL is offering its telephone customers unlimited access to the internet via home computers from April 17.

A Chinese woman in Beijing April 9 reads an editorial in a state newspaper which warns Taipei that «Beijing will not allow Taiwan independence in any form.

First Lady Barbara Bush talks with an army trooper as she and husband, President George H.W. Bush, eat a Thanksgiving Day lunch with the troops in eastern Saudi Arabia on November 22, 1990. Photo by Rick Wilking

Wasu-Duta, chief of the native American Dakota tribe, shakes hands with Pope
John Paul II in St. Peter’s Square during papal outdoor general audience,
September 10, 1980.

A young man, his head buried in a sidewalk hole, draws a crowd of
curious onlookers in Calcutta on February 12, 1991. The man is
practicing a form of yoga, Sidewalk mystics and artist like him are
part of the street panorama that attracts tourists in India.

Prisoners at the Carandiru Detention House, where 111 inmates died
during a police crackdown last week, tell journalists that the incident
was a ‘massacre’ and called for human rights groups to investigate
conditions at the dangerously overcrowded jail, Brazil’s largest, on
October 6, 1992. The state government has suspended the police
commanders who led the action. Photo by Jamil Ismail

Two Chinese children play in front of a Beijing Olympic games logo sculpture in Beijing August 16, 2000. Olympic fever is heating up in Beijing, with posters plastered around subway stations and advertisements in national newspapers for Beijing’s bid to host the 2008 Olympics.

A Three-Toed Tortoise is seen on a Galapagos Tortoise, Gosford, Australia, 27 Nov 1991. Photo by Mark Baker

A aerial view of Nabua dam at the foothills of Mount Iriga in the central Philippines December 12, which is in danger of falling apart after two typhoons struck the area within a span of five days, killing almost 300 people.

Children peek out of a shattered window in Sarajevo November 21.

A Filipino elder eyes a poster advertising the government’s campaign against drugs in Manila January 17. Newly appointed Interior and [Local Secretary Alfredo Lim] on Monday spraypainted houses of persons convicted or charged as drug pushers. [Lim], a former mayor and police General known for his «Dirty Harry» approach to crime, said the spray paint campaign was the key to removing the drug menace in the country.

A local torchbearer runs pass Uluru, formerly called Ayers Rock, June 8. The Olympic torch is spending 100 days travelling around Australia on its way to Sydney for the opening ceremony of the Sydney 2000 Olympic Games on September 15.

A People’s Libration Army (PLA) soldier walks past an advertisement board for a German sports equipment manufacturer featuring American NBA star, Kobe Bryant, in Beijing November 17, 2000. Foreign companies are increasing their promotion and advertisement budget in a race to capture a large market share when China eventually join the World Trade Organisation (WTO).