Week in pictures: 11-17 Dec

1 of 10 Two hundred soldiers of the Black Watch regiment return to the UK after a six-month Iraq tour. The tour included a controversial deployment to Camp Dogwood, near Baghdad, in which five soldiers died.

2 of 10 The world's highest road bridge was inaugurated in southern France by President Jacques Chirac. The Millau bridge over the River Tarn in the Massif Central mountains is more than 300m (984ft) high - taller even than the country's Eiffel Tower.

3 of 10 Rescuers sift through the wreckage of two passenger trains that collided in India's northern Punjab province.

4 of 10 A US soldier surveys the wreckage at the site of a suicide car bomb, close to Baghdad's central Green Zone.

5 of 10 Two Albanian gunman seized a commuter bus in Athens early on Wednesday, taking more than 20 people hostage. Greek police and special forces, highly trained to secure the Athens Olympics, were deployed to the area...

6 of 10 ...The gunmen finally decided late on Wednesday evening to let all the hostages go and surrender.

7 of 10 Former Chinese sex slaves forced to work in Japanese military brothels react angrily to a Tokyo court ruling denying them compensation.

8 of 10 Supporters of Iraqi Shia cleric Moqtada Sadr flagellate themselves to commemorate the death of his father.

9 of 10 Former Home Secretary David Blunkett leaves the Home Office for the last time, after resigning from his cabinet post.

10 of 10 Hospital staff attend to conjoined twin boys, found abandoned in the street in Hefei in eastern China.