An executive for Chinese tech giant Huawei suffered a legal setback Wednesday when a Canadian judge ruled that proceedings to extradite her to the United States will go ahead. The decision on so-called double criminality, a key test for extradition, found that bank fraud accusations against Meng Wanzhou would stand up in Canada.

Police from Bosnia, Croatia and regional agency Europol caught eight suspected traffickers on Wednesday and blocked the smuggling of 45 migrants into the EU, news wires reported. The detainees are suspected of transporting, hiding and smuggling migrants mostly from Turkey via Bosnia into EU member Croatia and onwards to Italy, Bosnia's state prosecutor's office said, calling the arrests the region's most comprehensive operation this year.

The US coronavirus death toll passed 100,000 as the pandemic tightened its grip on South America, which is outpacing Europe and the United States in daily infections.

South Korea re-imposed a series of coronavirus social distancing measures on Thursday, as a series of clusters threatened to challenge its success in containing the epidemic.

Drug giant GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) laid out plans on Thursday to produce 1 billion doses of vaccine efficacy boosters, or adjuvants, next year, news wires reported. The move is a part of the race to develop and produce a successful solution to the coronavirus crisis. The world’s largest vaccine maker said it was in talks with governments to back a manufacturing expansion.

Tensions between China and India over their Himalayan border have escalated, with China accused of moving thousands of troops into disputed territory and expanding a military airbase in the disputed region along the eastern Ladakh border, news wires reported.

The United States announced on Wednesday it was ending waivers in its sanctions for nations that remain in the Iran nuclear accord, news wires reported. The decision will bring the deal further to the verge of collapse, observers believe.

A team of 25,000 contact tracers will make their first phone calls within hours - to track down people who will be told to self-isolate under the new test and trace scheme in England, the BBC reported. Tracers will text, email or call people who test positive with coronavirus and ask who they have had contact with. Any of those contacts deemed at risk of infection will be told to isolate for 14 days, even if they are not sick.

US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo informed Congress on Wednesday that Hong Kong cannot be considered to have a high degree of autonomy from China and therefore no longer warrants special treatment under US law. The status change could be a major blow to Hong Kong's trading relationship with the US and the ability of its residents to obtain visas.

US President Donald Trump threatened Wednesday to shut down all social media platforms after Twitter for the first time acted against his false tweets, prompting the enraged Republican to double down on unsubstantiated claims and conspiracy theories. Newswires report that Trump will even sign an executive order "pertaining to social media" on Thursday, without offering more detail about its contents.