TIME's Best Pictures of the Week: December 13 – December 20, 2013

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Navesh Chitrakar—Reuters
Dec. 17, 2013. A Newari woman, with her lips and face painted to depict a deity, sits inside a house before she takes part in a parade to celebrate the Yamari Puni festival in Kathmandu.





Fred Dufour—AFP/Getty Images
Dec. 18, 2013. A woman stands in a corridor of a building in the Christian camp for internally displaced people (IDP) in Bossangoa, Central African Republic.





John Moore—Getty Images
Dec. 14, 2013. A Christmas decoration lies on display near the former site of Sandy Hook Elementary in Newtown, Ct.





David Guttenfelder—AP
Dec. 16, 2013. North Koreans lay flowers at the base of statues of the late leaders Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong Il at Mansu Hill in Pyongyang, North Korea.





Karen Bleier—AFP/Getty Images
Dec. 19, 2013 A view looking up from the Rotunda of the U.S. Capitol before a tour of the dome in Washington, DC.





China Daily/Reuters
Dec. 15, 2013. A cow, which escaped from a truck, attacks a farmer trying to catch it in Liangdun village of Nangang township, Anhui province, China.





Julian Stratenschulte—AFP/Getty Images
Dec. 16, 2013. A sculpture is silhouetted against the full moon in Hanover, central Germany.





Tobias Schwarz—Reuters
Dec. 16, 2013. Labor Minister Ursula von der Leyen, Christian Social Union (CSU) Bundestag faction leader Gerda Hasselfeld, leader of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) and Chancellor Angel Merkel, Thomas Oppermann of the Social Democratic Party (SPD) CDU parliamentary faction leader Volker Kauder, CDU secretary general Hermann Groehe, Federal Chancellery Minister Ronald Pofalla, SPD Chairman Sigmar Gabriel and SPD parliamentary faction leader Frank-Walter Steinmeier (clockwise from top) talk informally after the coalition government agreement signing ceremony in Berlin.





Yannis Behrakis—Reuters
Dec. 15, 2013. A local boy, Anda, looks out from his hut's window at the burial ground of late former South African President Nelson Mandela ahead of his funeral in Qunu, South Africa.





Matt Slocum—AP
Dec. 14, 2013. Army cadets hold a large photo of Army head coach Rich Ellerson during an NCAA college football game against Navy in Philadelphia.

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Atef Safadi—EPA
Dec. 14, 2013. Birds fly over the border fence covered in snow near the Northern Israeli village of Majdal Shams, Golan Heights, on the Israeli-Syrian border.





Andrew Biraj—Reuters
Dec. 13, 2013. A boy tries to control a fire after vehicles were torched and vandalized by Bangladesh's Jamaat-e-Islami party activists during clashes with police in Dhaka, Bangladesh.





Ozan Kose—AFP/Getty Images
Dec. 13, 2013. Whirling dervishes perform during a ceremony marking the anniversary of the death of Jelaleddin Mevlana Rumi, Sufi mystic, poet and founder of the sufism at Ulker Sports Arena in Istanbul.





Francois Guillot—AFP/Getty Images
Dec. 14, 2013. A contestant of the beauty contest mini Miss France 2014, for children from 5 to 11 years old, parades in Paris.





Stephen Lam—Reuters
Dec. 14, 2013. Jill Corey (below) reacts while wrestling with Dan Robertson as holiday revelers dressed as Santa Claus gather in Duboce Park during the SantaCon event in San Francisco.





Fred Dufour—AFP/Getty Images
Dec. 14, 2013. People walk on the tarmac to reach the refugee camp, close to the airport of Bangui, Central African Republic.





Ivan Lieman—AFP/Getty Images
Dec. 14, 2013. Anti-Balaka fighters, members of a militia opposed to the Seleka rebel group, show what they would do to any Seleka, in the Boy-Rabe neighborhood in Bangui, Central African Republic.





Bernat Armangue—AP
Dec. 14, 2013. The motorcade transporting the body of Nelson Mandela, in black hearse, passes through crowds of mourners gathered in the town of on its way to Qunu, South Africa.





Dan Kitwood—Getty Images
Dec. 14, 2013. Xhosa youths walk over a hillside overlooking the home town of former South African President Nelson Mandela before his funeral cortege arrives at his family's home in Qunu, South Africa.





Robert F. Bukaty—AP
Dec. 14, 2013. A makeshift memorial with crosses for the victims of the Sandy Hook massacre stands outside a home in Newtown, Conn.

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AFP/Getty Images
Dec. 14, 2013. Workers construct stands for the 2014 Winter Olympics spectators in Krasnaya Polyana near the Russian Black Sea resort of Sochi.





Ruben Salgado—Getty Images
Dec. 14, 2013. Athletes in the 55kg category get ready to compete in the bodybuilding contest at the Myanmar Convention Center during the 2013 SEA Game in Yangon, Burma.





Reuters
Dec. 15, 2013. A photograph of the giant screen at the Beijing Aerospace Control Center shows photo of China's Chang'e 3 probe, taken by the country's first lunar rover, Yutu, during the mutual-photograph process, in Beijing.





Mahmoud Hebbo—Reuters
Dec. 15, 2013. A mortar fired by Free Syrian Army fighters explodes, injuring fighters nearby, in Aleppo.





Bilal Hussein—AP
Dec. 15, 2013. Syrian refugees walk outside their tents at a refugee camp in the eastern Lebanese border town of Arsal, Lebanon.





Muhammed Muheisen—AP
Dec. 15, 2013. A South African woman, dances in her laundry bucket, backdropped by the site of the funeral service of former President Nelson Mandela, in Qunu, South Africa.





Antoine de Ras—AP
Dec. 15, 2013. A group of Zulu warriors, from KwaZulu Natal watch a flypast from near a public viewing tent during the burial of former South African president Nelson Mandela in Qunu, South Africa.





Marco Longari—AFP/Getty Images
Dec. 15, 2013. A woman looks on as South African former president Nelson Mandela's coffin is carried to his burial site during his state funeral in Qunu, South Africa.





Markus Schreiber—AP
Dec. 16, 2013. Visitors to the Voortrekker Monument watch as a ray of sunlight shines on the unmarked tomb in the basement of the monument during Day of Reconciliation celebrations in Pretoria, South Africa.





China Daily/Reuters
Dec. 16, 2013. A giant panda plays in the snow at a zoo in Kunming, Yunnan province, China.

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Amel Emric—AP
Dec. 16, 2013. Bosnian people walking on the street during heavy smog in northern Bosnian town of Tuzla, 140 kms. north of Sarajevo.





Alaa Badarneh—EPA
Dec. 16, 2013. A Palestinian clown dressed as a tiger plays in snow on a snow covered hill in the West Bank city of Nablus.





Giovanni Isolino—AFP/Getty Images
Dec. 16, 2013. Lava flows from the Mount Etna volcano on the southern Italian island of Sicily near Catania.





Jacky Chen—Reuters
Dec. 16, 2013. North Korean girls carry firewood on their backs as they walk on the banks of Yalu River, some 100 kilometers (62 miles) from the North Korean town of Sinuiju, opposite the Chinese border city of Dandong.





KCNA/Reuters
Undated. North Korean leader Kim Jong Un gives field guidance to the August 25 Fisheries Station under KPA 313 Unit, in this undated photo released by North Korea's Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) in Pyongyang on December 16, 2013.





Mohammed Salem—Reuters
Dec. 16, 2013. Members of Palestinian civil defense paddle a boat to evacuate people from their houses that are flooded with rainwater, in the northern Gaza Strip.





Aykut Unlupinar—Anadolu Agency/TT/Sipa USA/Scanpix Sweden
Dec. 16, 2013. Ukrainian protestors continue their anti-government demonstrations in Kiev's Independence Square.





Zohra Bensemra—Reuters
Dec. 16, 2013. Pakistani Christian boys decorate a Christmas tree on the roof of their house in Islamabad.





Mohammed Abed—AFP/Getty Images
Dec. 17, 2013. A Palestinian family sits in a tent after their house was flooded following a huge storms across the Levant that left the Gaza Strip under flood waters in Beit Lahia in the northern Gaza Strip.





Ulet Ifansasti—Getty Images
Dec. 17, 2013. A sulfur miner carries a goats head in a white bag as he climbs to bury the head in the crater as part of an annual offering ceremony on the Ijen volcano in Yogyakarta, Indonesia.

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Michael Fiala—Reuters
Dec. 17, 2013. A tree smoulders in an area that burned down to Highway 1 during a wild fire in Big Sur, Calif.





John Stillwell—PA Photos/Landov
Dec. 17, 2913. One of the Crossrail tunnels under construction below the streets of Whitechapel, east London, which has proved to be one of the most challenging and impressive sites in the whole Crossrail project, and will be part of the 38 station route from Maidenhead Royal Berkshire in the west to Shenfield in Essex in the east.





Dmitry Lovetsky—AP
Dec. 17, 2013. The full moon rises behind the Monument of Ukraine independence during a Pro-European Union rally in the Independence Square in Kiev, Ukraine.





Mark Kolbe—Getty Images
Dec. 17, 2013. The Australia team celebrate victory and a 3-0 series win after taking the wicket of James Anderson of England during day five of the Third Ashes Test Match between Australia and England at WACA in Perth, Australia.





Francois Mori—AP
Dec. 17, 2013. Kites in the shape of Santa Claus glide in the wind as part of a kite exhibition next to the Eiffel Tower in Paris.





Nir Elias—Reuters
Dec. 17, 2013. A horse walks in the snow at the base of Mount Hermon in the Golan Heights near the Israel-Syria border.





Fred Dufour—AFP/Getty Images
Dec. 17, 2013. Members of the former Central African Armed Forces (FACA) and anti-balaka militian take part in a drill in the suburbs of Bangui, Central African Republic.





Mohammed Al-Khatieb—AFP/Getty Images
Dec. 17, 2013. Syrians search for survivors amidst the rubble following an airstrike in the Shaar neighborhood of Aleppo.





Mohammed Al-Khatieb—AFP/Getty Images
Dec. 17, 2013. A Syrian man helps an injured man following an airstrike in Aleppo's Maadi neighborhood.





David Guttenfelder—AP
Dec. 17, 2013. North Koreans bow beneath portraits of the late leaders Kim Jong Il and Kim Il Sung in Pyongyang.

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Jerome Delay—AP
Dec. 17, 2013. Joelle, 16 month-old, a severely malnourished child, sits on her hospital bed at Bangui's pediatric center in Bangui, Central African Republic.





AFP/Getty Images
Dec. 18, 2013. People arrive to seek refuge in the UNMISS compound in Juba, South Sudan.





Fred Dufour—AFP/Getty Images
Dec. 18, 2013. A boy scared from machete strikes waits in his room at the pedriatic hospital in Bangui, Central African Republic.





Ammar Awad—Reuters
Dec. 18, 2013. A priest walks near columns inside the Church of Nativity, revered as the site of Jesus' birth, ahead of Christmas in the West Bank town of Bethlehem.





China Daily/Reuters
Dec. 18, 2013. A member of China's national pole dance team performs at a park after the city's first snow this winter in Tianjin.





Biswaranjan Rout—AP
Dec. 19, 2013. Villagers walk home carrying water collected from the Kuakhai River on a foggy morning in Bhubaneswar, India.