A selection of the week’s best photos from across the African continent and beyond:
PATRICK MEINHARDT / AFP
Miss Universe Kenya contestants prepare backstage in Nairobi on Friday…
PATRICK MEINHARDT / AFP
They are cheered on enthusiastically by the audience.
WIKTOR SZYMANOWICZ / GETTY IMAGES
On the same day, models showcase clothes from Nigerian-born fashion designer Adebayo Oke-Lawal at the V&A museum in the UK.
CARLOS SANTIAGO / GETTY IMAGES
Malian basketballer Maimouna Haidara sports multi-coloured hair at a match against Venezuela in Mexico. The West Africans went on to win 88-66.
DOAA ADEL / GETTY IMAGES
A man crafts decorative Khayamiya textiles at a covered market in Cairo, Egypt, on Saturday.
FOUR PAWS / EPA
Forty-two-year-old retired circus elephant, Charlie, is transferred to a game reserve in South Africa’s Limpopo province on Wednesday.
MONICAH MWANGI / REUTERS
A customer thanks a robot for serving her food at the Robot Cafe in Nairobi on Thursday.
JEFF BOTARI / GETTY IMAGES
Dricus Du Plessis of South Africa and Israel Adesanya of Nigeria embrace after slugging it out at their UFC middleweight championship fight on Sunday, won by Du Plessis.
WILFRIED MBINAH / AFP
People wave flags in Gabon’s capital, Libreville, during Saturday’s Independence Day parade.
YASSINE GAIDI / GETTY IMAGES
Christians carry an effigy of the Virgin Mary during the Madonna of Trapani festival on Friday in Tunisia’s capital, Tunis.
GUERCHOM NDEBO / AFP
Fans in Goma get hyped up before a Fally Ipupa concert on Friday. The Congolese singer ended up cancelling a string of his shows – refunds were promised but many ticket-buyers complain they have not got their money back yet.
SIMON MAINA / AFP
Kenyan rap duo Wadagliz pose for the camera during an interview in Nairobi. Their hit song Anguka Nayo – meaning “Roll With It” – has become a soundtrack to recent youth-led anti-government rallies.
OUPA BOPAPE / GETTY IMAGES
In Johannesburg on Saturday, South African actress Abigail Kubeka is honoured at an event marking her 67-year career.
CHANCELIN MBAIRAMADJI MOITA/EPA
People in the flooded capital of Chad, N’Djamena, use a boat to get around on Wednesday. More than 16,000 homes have been damaged and destroyed in the country since mid-July.
TCHANDROU NITANGA / AFP
Burundian journalist and government critic Floriane Irangabiye thanks her legal team who had pleaded with the president to free her from prison, which he finally did on Friday, granting her an official pardon.
ARLETTE BASHIZI / REUTERS
On Sunday, in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, Justine Munguiko holds her child who has been cured of mpox. This virus is “not the new Covid” because authorities clearly know how to control its spread, a leading World Health Organization expert has said.
IOM / REUTERS
On Wednesday, food aid is finally permitted to enter Sudan’s Darfur region for the first time in six months. The breakthrough came following international pressure to avert full-scale famine. More than half of the country’s population need assistance, the UN estimates.
AMOS GUMULIRA / AFP
Malawi’s main opposition DPP gathers on Sunday for a party conference where ex-President Peter Mutharika was formally chosen to stand in next year’s presidential election.
JIHED ABIDELLAOUI / REUTERS
Fisheries engineer Ramla Bouhlel handles a Posidonia plant in Tunisia’s coastal city of Monastir on Friday. According to the World Wide Fund for Nature (WFF), this type of seagrass “creates essential living habitats for thousands of marine species”.
ESA ALEXANDER / REUTERS
And on Monday evening a supermoon, also known as the Blue Moon, rises over Cape Town in South Africa.
PATRICK MEINHARDT / AFP
PATRICK MEINHARDT / AFP
WIKTOR SZYMANOWICZ / GETTY IMAGES
CARLOS SANTIAGO / GETTY IMAGES
DOAA ADEL / GETTY IMAGES
FOUR PAWS / EPA
MONICAH MWANGI / REUTERS
JEFF BOTARI / GETTY IMAGES
WILFRIED MBINAH / AFP
YASSINE GAIDI / GETTY IMAGES
GUERCHOM NDEBO / AFP
SIMON MAINA / AFP
OUPA BOPAPE / GETTY IMAGES
CHANCELIN MBAIRAMADJI MOITA/EPA
TCHANDROU NITANGA / AFP
ARLETTE BASHIZI / REUTERS
IOM / REUTERS
AMOS GUMULIRA / AFP 
JIHED ABIDELLAOUI / REUTERS
ESA ALEXANDER / REUTERS
Getty Images/BBC