Malaysia

North Korea breaks off diplomatic relations with Malaysia in protest of the extradition of a North Korean to the United States. North Korea's Foreign Ministry accuses the Malaysian government of committing a "shameful act and an unforgivable, serious crime." The North Korean involved was innocent, the statement released Friday by state media said.

Malaysia's highest court had ruled last week that a North Korean businessman living in the country could be extradited to the U.S., accusing him of banned exports of luxury items to North Korea and money laundering. North Korea is subject to tough international sanctions because of its nuclear weapons program.

After a major outbreak of Covid-19, Top Glove, the world's largest manufacturer of latex gloves has shut down over half of its factories. Out of 5,800 tested employees 2,453 have tested positive for Covid-19.

According to Director-General of Health Noor Hisham Abdullah, "All those who tested positive have been hospitalised and their close contacts have been quarantined to avoid infecting other workers,".

Najib Razak, Malaysian Prime Minister from 2009 to 2018, has been sentenced to 12 years in prison and fined 210 million ringgit (49.3 million dollars). The ruling convicts him of criminal breach of trust, money laundering and abuse of power related to the state investment fund 1MDB.

Last week, Goldman Sachs and the Malaysian government had reached an agreement regarding the alleged misuse of funds from 1MDB. The US Department of Justice has repatriated hundreds of millions of dollars to Malaysia after recovering assets - such as Picasso artwork and a luxury yacht - it said were purchased to launder money stolen from 1MDB.

The Malaysian government is allowing businesses to reopen after the lockdown had been in place since the 18th of March. In order to combat the spread of the coronavirus, all foreign workers are now required to undergo mandatory testing after a new cluster of infected people was detected over the weekend. The cluster was detected near Kuala Lumpur at a construction site and multiple of the positively tested people were forgein workers.

The Malaysian company Karex Bhd had stopped the production of condoms following a lockdown by the government due to the coronavirus. This has led to a missing production of around 100 million condoms, with the company normally producing 20 percent of all condoms globally. Now deemed a critical industry the government has permitted to start the production again with 50% of the workforce.