WORLD

North Korean troops shot dead a South Korean fisheries official who went missing earlier this week, before dousing his body in oil and setting it on fire in what was likely an effort to prevent a coronavirus outbreak, South Korea's military said on Thursday.

Sir Harold Evans, a British-American editor whose 70-year career as a hard-driving investigative journalist, magazine founder, book publisher and author made him one of the most influential media figures of his generation, died on Wednesday at the age of 92.

President Alexander Lukashenko is not the legitimate president of Belarus, the European Union said on Thursday, saying his abrupt swearing-in on Wednesday went directly against the will of the people.

Wong Wai-yin's wife feared the worst after reading his short farewell letter.

Locked in a power struggle with opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim, Malaysian Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin needs a solid victory in a state election on the island of Borneo on Saturday to stop support within his coalition parties melting away, analysts say.

Myanmar has quarantined tens of thousands of people to prevent a coronavirus outbreak from overwhelming its fragile healthcare system but public health experts and doctors say the strategy is on the brink of collapse as infections surge.

China has barred entry to two "anti-China" Australian scholars, the Global Times newspaper said on Thursday, citing unidentified sources, amid heightened tension between Beijing and Canberra.

Hong Kong police arrested prominent democracy activist Joshua Wong on Thursday for participating in an unauthorised assembly in October 2019 and violating the city's anti-mask law, according to a post on his official Twitter account.

A German man whom investigators suspect of murdering British toddler Madeleine McCann and currently jailed for drug dealing may face more prison time after Europe's top court retroactively cleared his extradition to Germany for a rape charge.