In this file photograph taken on December 25, 2005, Pope Benedict XVI delivers his first Christmas Day "Urbi et Orbi" (the city and the world) message to pilgrims and tourists on St Peter's Square at The Vatican. - Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI, a German theologian whose 2013 resignation took the world by surprise, died on December 31, 2022, at age 95, the Vatican announced. (Photo: AFP)

VATICAN CITY:  Former pope Benedict XVI, who in 2013 became the first pontiff to resign as head of the Catholic Church since the Middle Ages, died on Saturday aged 95, the Vatican announced.

"With sorrow I inform you that the Pope Emeritus, Benedict XVI, passed away today at 9:34 in the Mater Ecclesiae Monastery in the Vatican," Vatican spokesman Matteo Bruni said in a statement.