El Salvador has become the first country in the world to make Bitcoin legal tender, despite surveys showing widespread scepticism about the move. The government has invested more than $20 million in the cryptocurrency in recent days, saying it will open up access to banking for many Salvadorans. Bitcoin will be accepted for payments in parallel with the US dollar. Also today, millions of Americans have lost their unemployment benefits as several pandemic-era welfare programmes have expired.

The value of Bitcoin has plunged by more than 10 percent after El Salvador on Tuesday became the first country in the world to accept the cryptocurrency as legal tender. The launch was marred by protests and technical difficulties with the digital wallet app, which had to be taken offline for several hours. Also today, we report on tourism businesses in the southwest of France that have benefitted from the recent spell of good weather, which has prolonged their summer season.

On 7 September 2021, El Salvador became the first country to embrace bitcoin as legal tender. Consumer demand saw its brand-new cyber wallet system crash on its first day of use as the currency's value seesawed against the US dollar. While thousands of Salvadorans are already using the cryptocurrency for everyday transactions, hundreds have taken to the streets to protest with concerns about the safety and legitimacy of the cyber currency.

Thousands of Salvadorans march in San Salvador against the use of bitcoin in the economy and against a decree that ordered the dismissal of a third of the nation’s judges.

Pope Francis said that those who are indifferent to the poor "offend God." In a Christmas season overshadowed by coronavirus worries, he also urged followers to value the "little things in life."

An internet watchdog said an operator of the Israeli firm NSO Group's Pegasus was working almost exclusively in El Salvador in early 2020. El Salvador government denied using the sophisticated spyware.

In September 2021, El Salvador became the first nation in the world to make bitcoin its official currency, along with the US dollar. The experiment in the small Central American country was considered groundbreaking by some and too risky by others. Seven months on, our regional correspondents take a look at how it has changed the lives of Salvadorians, for better or for worse.

Although El Salvador has seen a fall in the number of homicides, the country suffers from another type of crime that the government avoids talking about. Gangs are stepping up kidnappings and forced disappearances, terrorising the most vulnerable, who increasingly end up dead. Faced with the authorities' silence, who keep no official register, victims' loved ones are speaking out. Our regional correspondents Laurence Cuvillier and Matthieu Comin report.

A court in El Salvador has sentenced a woman to 30 years in prison because she suffered an obstetric emergency that ended her pregnancy. Abortions are banned in the Central American country.

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Ex El Salvador soccer chief Reynaldo Vasquez sentenced to 16 months in prison after pleading guilty to a charge arising from a global FIFA corruption probe

El Salvador's president is waging war on gang violence. But human rights advocates tell DW that waves of mass arrests in the Central American country have swept innocent people into a violent, and deadly, prison system.