Today's best photos: from balloons in Kabul to pollution in India

‘The National’ selects the most striking pictures from around the world

TOPSHOT - This aerial photo taken on November 17, 2021 shows newly-produced cars lined up surrounded by recent snow at a BMW factory in Shenyang in China's northeastern Liaoning province. (Photo by AFP) / China OUT

The balloon seller of Kabul

Children gather around a man selling balloons in the Afghan capital Kabul.

Spinning top

Noe Seifert of Switzerland performs during the Swiss Cup Zurich 2021 gymnastics tournament.

Waste clothing mountain

Piles of used clothes discarded in the Atacama Desert in Chile. A new law in the country will forces clothes and textile importers to take charge of the waste they generate.

Border control

Motorists queue to cross the border into the US from Tijuana, Mexico. America's land borders with Mexico and Canada are now open to foreign travellers vaccinated against Covid-19.

The party isn't over

Russian Communist Party activists and supporters carry portraits of Soviet founder Vladimir Lenin, right, and dictator Josef Stalin, left, at a flower-laying ceremony at Lenin's Mausoleum in Moscow to mark the 104th anniversary of the October Revolution.

Snowy mountaintops

Snow covers terraced fields near the city of Handan, north-eastern China.

Pelican pit stop

Great white pelicans feed at the Mishmar HaSharon reservoir in Hefer Valley, Israel. The Israeli nature reserves authority feeds the pelicans at the reservoir as the birds make their way to Africa.

That's not ice

A woman prays on the banks of the Yamuna on a smoggy morning in New Delhi, India.