World highlights

• North Korea fired up to two short-range missiles off its west coast, said US and South Korean officials, prompting quick US criticism of Pyongyang over the second such launch in as many weeks.

• Rival Hamas and Fatah forces clashed in the Gaza Strip, killing at least one person and injuring 12 others, in the worst flare-up of factional fighting in almost three weeks. The fighting spread across the southern Gaza town of Rafah as Hamas and Fatah gunmen set up checkpoints and took up positions on rooftops.

• A sharply divided US Senate threw into doubt the fate of a White House-backed plan to revamp US immigration laws. In a serious blow to the bipartisan effort, the Senate fell 27 votes short of the 60 votes needed in the 100-member chamber to limit debate and advance the major overhaul toward passage.

• Cyclone Gonu waned into a storm as it passed into a major oil shipping route towards Iran, but killed 28 people and left a trail of destruction that halted Oman's oil and gas exports for a third day. Gonu had peaked as a maximum-force Category Five hurricane on Tuesday.