Nearly 13m people are hoarding millions of dollars’ worth of the stylish 50 peso note, featuring Mexico’s cutest critter

For most of her life, Gorda was just an axolotl who lived in a museum in Mexico City – that is, until she became the star of the country’s favourite banknote.

The note, which features a depiction of Gorda as the model for Mexico’s iconic species of salamander, went into circulation in 2021, dazzling the judges of the International Bank Notes Society, who declared it the Note of the Year.

Alleged trafficker Zhi Dong Zhang escaped via a tunnel in Mexico before flying to Cuba and reportedly Russia but now finds himself on trial in a Brooklyn courtroom

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Like so many great escapes, it involved a tunnel.

One night in July, in the Mexico City neighbourhood where he was under house arrest, Zhi Dong Zhang snuck through a hole into the property nextdoor and escaped from under the noses of the soldiers guarding him.