Bloodbath after Mexico Marine shootout with gangsters

The challenges facing Mexico City's first ever female mayor

Mexico City's government is promoting indigenous and other traditionally-woven baskets and reusable bags in an effort to help residents curb their addiction to plastic, now that Mexico City has banned the use of plastic bags.

A Russian court sentences former US marine Paul Whelan to 16 years in a penal colony for espionage in a case that strained ties with Washington and fuelled speculation of a prisoner swap. Moscow City Court found Whelan guilty of receiving classified information as he stood in the dock with a sign that read "Sham trial!" and pleaded for US President Donald Trump to intervene in the case.

Mammoth skeletons are discovered at an airport construction site just north of Mexico City -- not far from the scene of a similar discovery in 2019 -- and experts say that remains of other prehistoric animals have also been recovered in the area of the find.

Students from the Faculty of Arts and Design of the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM) paint a mural on the façade of the National School of Nursing and Obstetrics, dedicated to nurses who have worked throughout the coronavirus crisis in Mexico. More than one hundred students are involved in the project, working in small teams each day to avoid crowds, and the mural will eventually extend to a length of over 100 metres, featuring the portraits of nurses who have cared for Covid-19 patients.

"A sad Christmas is coming, with hunger, in which people will cry as they don't have anything to eat," says one Mexico City street vendor, after local authorities ordered the closure of local businesses due to a rise in Covid-19 cases. Some street vendors attempt to defy orders to keep selling, but without success, says 80-year-old Julieta Muñoz: "I haven't sold a single item, nothing in the last four days."

One of the world's biggest cities has prohibited the use of single-use plastic materials including plastic forks, straws and cups. Mexico's capital is striving to revamp its image as an eco-friendly, sustainable city.

Workers from the restaurant industry bang pots and pans in the streets of Mexico City, demanding authorities in the capital allow them to reopen, despite a rise in hospitalisations of Covid-19 patients.

A bridge in the Mexican capital has collapsed. A metro train was passing over at the time. Emergency services are working to rescue victims.

Last month, a metro crash killed 26 people in Mexico City. The tragedy has highlighted the inequalities that prevail in the sprawling megalopolis. The damaged metro line was one of the few connections between poor neighbourhoods and downtown Mexico City, where jobs are located. These working-class areas are now more isolated than ever, while an overall lack of infrastructure exacerbates the gigantic social divide in the capital city of 23 million inhabitants. Our correspondents report.

The Cannes jury give a press conference as the film festival gets underway, with jury president Spike Lee denouncing authoritarians and the fact that black people are still "hunted down like animals" in the US.

Warming sea temperatures, pollution and dynamite fishing are causing Adriatic marine forests to disappear, a worrying trend which prompted Albanian experts to join a Mediterranean programme to restore them with 'good algaes'.