<div><span style="font-size: 1rem;">Former Pope Benedict XVI has died at his Vatican residence, aged 95, almost a decade after he stood down because of ailing health.</span><br></div><div><br></div><div>He led the Catholic Church for less than eight years until, in 2013, he became the first Pope to resign since Gregory XII in 1415.</div><div><br></div><div>Benedict spent his final years at the Mater Ecclesiae monastery within the walls of the Vatican.</div><div><br></div><div>His successor Pope Francis said he had visited him there frequently.</div><div><br></div><div>Although the former pontiff had been ill for some time, the Holy See said there had been an aggravation in his condition because of advancing age.</div><div><br></div><div>On Wednesday, Pope Francis appealed to his final audience of the year at the Vatican to "pray a special prayer for Pope Emeritus Benedict", whom he said was very ill.</div><div><br></div><div>Born Joseph Ratzinger in Germany, Benedict was 78 when in 2005 he became one of the oldest popes ever elected.</div><div><br></div><div>For much of his papacy, the Catholic Church faced allegations, legal claims and official reports into decades of child abuse by priests.</div><div><br></div><div>Earlier this year the former Pope acknowledged that errors had been made in the handling of abuse cases while he was archbishop of Munich between 1977 and 1982. - BBC</div><div><br></div><div>bnbd24/fas</div>