People around the world marked International Women's Day Friday with protests and celebrations.

Some countries marked the day by voting on -- or confirming -- groundbreaking legislation, while the failure of others to pass reforms on key issues such as abortion rights was the focus of some of Friday's protests.

Here is a round-up of some of the demonstrations.

AFGHANISTAN: Small groups of women staged rare demonstrations in private spaces, after a crackdown by Taliban authorities forced activists off the streets.

Max Verstappen topped Friday's Saudi Arabian Grand Prix third and final practice for the troubled Red Bull team after British teenager Oliver Bearman was handed a dramatic debut for Ferrari.

The defending three-time world champion clocked a best lap in one minute 28.412 seconds to beat Ferrari's Charles Leclerc by two-tenths as he again shrugged aside the controversy around the team, following Christian Horner being cleared of all allegations of improper conduct last week.

A medic at Gaza's largest hospital said Friday a humanitarian airdrop in the north of the Palestinian territory killed five people and wounded 10.

The casualties were taken to Gaza City's Al-Shifa hospital, the emergency room's head nurse, Mohammed al-Sheikh, told AFP.

Sheikh said the deadly airdrop occurred north of the coastal Al-Shati refugee camp.

A witness from the camp told AFP he and his brother followed the parachuted aid in the hope of getting "a bag of flour".

Spain's Carlos Sainz has been ruled out of the Saudi Arabia Grand Prix this weekend with appendicitis with 18-year-old British reserve driver Oliver Bearman taking his place, the Ferrari team announced Friday.

"Carlos Sainz has been diagnosed with appendicitis and will require surgery," the Italian team said in a statement.

"Oliver will therefore take no further part in this round of the F2 Championship. The Ferrari family wishes Carlos a speedy recovery."

European Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen expressed hope Friday that a humanitarian aid corridor from Cyprus to Gaza will open this weekend, amid fears of famine in the war-torn Palestinian territory.

"We are very close to opening this corridor, hopefully this Sunday," von der Leyen said following a visit to the Cypriot port of Larnaca with Cyprus's President Nikos Christodoulides.

Her announcement came after US President Joe Biden, in his State of the Union address on Thursday, said the US military would establish a "temporary pier" off Gaza's coast to bring in aid.

A group of South African Jewish women held an International Women's Day march on Friday to denounce their government's silence regarding abuse by Hamas fighters against Israeli hostages.

Organised by the South African Jewish Board of Deputies (SAJBD), the women marched in the scorching Johannesburg sun under the banner "Me Too unless you are a Jew".

"Jewish women are put to an extra burden of proof all over the world," one of the organisers, Gabriella Farber Cohen, said.

"I don't sleep anymore," Latifa Abu Hamid said while looking at pictures of her children hanging on the walls of her living room, two women and 10 men. All have passed through Israeli prisons.

Four are still languishing in jail while a fifth died in custody 14 months ago. His body remains in the hands of the Israelis, she said.

Another died in 1994, in an operation triggered by the death of an Israeli.

Hamid, 74, said she wanted to pave "another path" for her children, one of "education and knowledge".

An international effort gathered pace on Friday to get desperately needed humanitarian relief into Gaza by sea, in the latest bid to counter overland access restrictions blamed on Israel as it battles Hamas militants.

The dire conditions more than five months into the war have led some countries to airdrop food and other assistance over the besieged Gaza Strip, but a parachute malfunction turned the latest operation lethal.

For Muslims worldwide, Ramadan is a time of prayer, reflection and joyful evening meals, but all Gazans wish for this year is an end to five months of war and suffering.

It is a hope shared widely across the Islamic world, where the thoughts of many are with Gaza ahead of the fasting month which starts with the sighting of the crescent moon on Sunday or Monday.

The war sparked by Hamas's October 7 attack against Israel has devastated Gaza, killed tens of thousands of Palestinians and triggered violence elsewhere in the Middle East, from Lebanon to the seas off Yemen.

The number of female genital mutilation survivors tops 230 million worldwide, UNICEF said in a new report Thursday, an increase of 15 percent since 2016 despite progress against the practice in some countries.

"It is indeed bad news. This is a huge number, a number that is bigger than ever before," said Claudia Coppa, lead author of the report released to coincide with International Women's Day.

Female genital mutilation, known as FGM, can include partial or total removal of the clitoris as well as the labia minora, and suturing of the vaginal opening to narrow it.