The Ukrainian parliament has voted to allocate an additional 495.3 billion hryvnias (about $11.96 billion) for defence, the country's Finance Ministry has said.

The voting on Wednesday was supported by 298 votes in favour, surpassing the required minimum of 226, lawmaker Yaroslav Zheleznyak was quoted by news agency as saying.

With the sum, Ukraine's expenditures for defence will reach 3.73 trillion hryvnias (about $90 billion) in 2024, Zheleznyak wrote on Telegram.

Ukraine will source additional funds for military needs from hiked taxes and additional placement of domestic government debt bonds, among other sources, according to lawmaker Rolsolana Pidlasa.

At least eight Palestinians were killed in an Israeli attack on a school sheltering displaced people east of Gaza City, said Palestinian sources.

Israeli aircraft bombed the 'Ibn Al-Haytham' school housing displaced people in the Shuja'iyya neighbourhood on Wednesday, news agency reported quoting Palestinian security sources.

"Our teams recovered the bodies of eight victims, including five children and two women, as a result of the Israeli airstrike," the Gaza Civil Defence said in a press statement.

Local sources and eyewitnesses said the airstrike caused significant destruction to the schoolyard and classrooms.

The Canadian federal government has announced a further reduction of international students to manage the volume of temporary resident arrivals.

Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) said in a news release on Wednesday that in 2025 new international student study permits will be reduced by 10 per cent from the 2024 target of 485,000, which means reducing study permits issued to 437,000, news agency reported.

The number of study permits issued in 2026 will remain the same as in 2025, the release said.

North Korea test-fired a new-type tactical ballistic missile and an improved strategic cruise missile on Wednesday, as country's top leader Kim Jong Un called for bolstering up the military capability for self-defence when he guided the event, state news agency KCNA reported on Thursday.

The test-fire of the new-type tactical ballistic missile, called Hwasongpho-11-Da-4.5, was aimed at verifying the hitting accuracy at a medium range of 320 km and explosive power of its payload of a 4.5 tonnage super-large conventional warhead, the KCNA said.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has signed a decree extending an embargo on agricultural products from Western countries for another two years, local media reported.

The embargo, which will run from January 1, 2025, to December 31, 2026, marks the first time the extension has exceeded one year, news agency reported.

Originally enacted in August 2014 in retaliation for Western sanctions over the Russia-Ukraine conflict, the ban affects products from the US, the EU, Australia, Norway, and Canada. The restrictions were later expanded to other European countries, including Ukraine.

Large tropical storm Pulasan is expected to make its closest approach to the main island of Okinawa Prefecture in southwestern Japan on Wednesday evening, the country's weather agency said.

The Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA) said Pulasan, packing winds of up to about 80 kilometres per hour with maximum gusts of 126 kilometres per hour, was moving at 20 kilometres per hour over waters south of Minami-Daito Island in Okinawa on Wednesday morning.

Okinawa's main island and the Amami region of Kagoshima Prefecture are expected to be hit with winds of up to 72 kilometres per hour, with maximum gusts possibly reaching 108 kilometres per hour, according to the JMA.

Tokyo stocks closed higher on Wednesday, as exporters were lifted by the Yen's weakness, but gains were trimmed amid a wait-and-see stance ahead of the US Federal Reserve's decision on interest rate cuts.

Japan's benchmark Nikkei stock index, the 225-issue Nikkei Stock Average, ended up 176.95 points, or 0.49 per cent, from Tuesday at 36,380.17, news agency reported.

The broader Topix index, meanwhile, finished 9.61 points, or 0.38 per cent, higher at 2,565.37.

The US dollar briefly weakened to the lower 141-yen zone in Tokyo. Market watchers here noted that the US currency's setback in Tokyo likely reflected uncertainty over whether the Fed will cut interest rates by 0.25 percentage point or a deeper 0.50 point.

Twenty-five people were injured when a train derailed in South Africa's Western Cape province, local authorities confirmed on Wednesday.

The derailment occurred at Dal Josafat Station near Paarl, about 60 kilometres northeast of Cape Town, according to a statement by Metrorail Western Cape.

"The train was en route from Cape Town to Wellington station when the incident occurred," Metrorail said in the statement.

"Twenty-five passengers were injured and transported by ambulance to various hospitals for treatment. No fatalities were reported. Other passengers onboard were transported to their homes," he added.

Iran's President Masoud Pezeshkian said that strengthening cooperation between Tehran and Moscow would help mitigate the impacts of Western sanctions and "unjust" measures imposed on both nations.

Pezeshkian made the remarks on Tuesday in a meeting with visiting Secretary of the Russian Federation Security Council Sergei Shoigu, according to a statement on the website of his office.

Emphasising the background of "constructive" relations between Iran and Russia, Pezeshkian said bilateral ties would be developed on a "permanent, continuous, and lasting path."

A Taiwanese company on Wednesday denied manufacturing the pagers involved in detonations across Lebanon, which resulted in the deaths of at least nine people and left nearly 3,000 others, including Hezbollah fighters and medics injured, local media reported.

Taiwan's Gold Apollo Co. said that the pagers used in detonations in Lebanon were not made by it, but by a Hungarian company which has a license to use its brand.

"The product was not ours. It was only that it had our brand on it," Gold Apollo founder and President Hsu Ching-Kuang was quoted as saying by the Taipei Times as he addressed the media at the company's offices in New Taipei City on Wednesday.