Women's Day Special: Making a mark in a man's world

As our salute to women on their day, we present images from across the world showing how the fairer sex has broken deep-rooted barriers to leave a mark in our male-dominated society.

In this photograph, Sakiba Covic (L) and Semsa Hadzo, the only female coal miners in all of Bosnia and Herzegovina, wait for the elevator in a coal mine in Breza.

Their job requires them to take daily measurements of air, gas and to supervise the general safety of the mine, according to local media.

...

Makpal Abrazakova, 25, trains her golden eagle Akzhelke outside her home village of Aksu-Ayuly in central Kazakhstan.

Makpal, who is professionally trained as a lawyer, is the only female eagle hunter in Kazakhstan. She started learning falconry from her father at the age of 13.

...

Women taxi drivers wait before taking an oath against "unnecessary honking" at a function organised by the traffic police in Mumbai.

...

Afghan girls work at the first Internet cafe for women in Kabul.

Afghanistan opened its first female-only internet cafe last year, hoping to give women a chance to connect to the world without verbal and sexual harassment and free from the unwanted gazes of their countrymen.

...

US Army soldier SSG Norma Gonzales of 426 Civil Affairs Battalion reads a magazine next to fellow soldiers while waiting to be ferried by a helicopter to different American military bases in Kandahar.

...

A police officer helps Hank Houda (L), a 37-year-old bomb-disposal expert, to adjust her protective suit during a training session at a police barracks in Algiers, Algeria.

Houda, who is one of 12 female bomb disposal experts in an occupation predominantly filled by male counterparts, said she joined as personal challenge to show a society where it is unusual for women to undertake dangerous career paths that she could carry out her duties as well as her male colleagues.

...

Professor Rita Yao Kakou of the Association of Women Researchers in the Ivory Coast conducts a class as her students listen in Nbadon, Abidjan.

The association was formed to raise the profile of women working in scientific research in the Ivory Coast. It helps women raise funding for their projects and seeks to promote scientific research, a field dominated by men, as a viable career option among young women by helping them obtain scholarships.

...

Sarah Attar, the first Saudi Arabian female to participate in track and field events, runs in her women's 800m round 1 heat at the London 2012 Olympic Games at the Olympic Stadium.

...

Female Afghan National Police officers aim their weapons during a drill at a training centre near the German Bundeswehr army camp Marmal in Mazar-e-Sharif, northern Afghanistan.

...

Pakistani schoolgirl Malala Yousufzai waves with nurses as she is discharged from The Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Birmingham.

The Pakistani girl shot in the head by the Taliban for advocating girls' education was discharged from the specialist British hospital after doctors said she was well enough to spend some time recovering with her family.

...

Members of the Russian radical feminist group 'Pussy Riot' sing a song at the Lobnoye Mesto, long before used for announcing Russian tsars' decrees and occasionally for carrying out public executions, in Red Square in Moscow.

Eight activists, who were later detained by police, staged a performance to protest against the policies conducted by Prime Minister Vladimir Putin.

...

Andean women fight for the ball during a soccer match in Lima, Peru.

...

Tatiana Likhoshapka, 24, a police officer and dog handler, shoots a pistol during a training session with a German shepherd dog named Antei at a police base in a suburb of Russia's Siberian city of Krasnoyarsk.

...

Police officers participate in a parade during the celebration of the 183rd anniversary of the Uruguayan Police Force in downtown Montevideo.

...

Female mechanics work on brakes in the first garage run only by women in Le Cres, near Montpellier, southern France.

France's first garage run entirely by women, including ex-flight attendants and a beautician, hopes to attract customers who are more likely to trust a woman. After a 22 month training programme, 15 women joined the garage as mechanics, bodywork specialists and saleswomen.

...

A Ninjutsu practitioner performs a split as members of various Ninjutsu schools showcase their skills to the media in a gym at Karaj, 45 km northwest of Tehran, Iran.

Currently about 3000 to 3500 women train in Ninjutsu in independently run clubs throughout Iran working under the supervision of the Ministry of Sports' Martial Arts Federation.

...

A North Korean traffic policewoman stands on a road in Pyongyang.

...

Um Jaafar, a woman fighter in the Free Syrian Army, sits with her husband Abu Jaafar, a Sawt al-Haq (Voice of Rights) battalion commander, and her daughter Faten at their home in Aleppo.

Um Jaafar was a women's hairdresser before the revolution and after being trained by her husband, she is now a member of a Sawt al-Haq battalion on the frontline of Aleppo's Sheikh Saeed neighbourhood.

...

A protester with a gag tied around her mouth takes part in a silent protest for the gang rape victim in New Delhi.

...