Two of the nation’s most well-known Covid-19 experts have filed complaints against the University of Auckland, arguing that their employer hasn’t taken enough steps to protect them against “a small but venomous sector of the public”…

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A 17-year-old has been arrested but police still seek others after three New Year’s holiday retail burglaries in the Napier and Hastings central business districts.The burglaries, which police believe are linked, included a ram-raid…

South Korea's military said on Sunday that an unidentified person crossed the heavily fortified border into North Korea.

The person was earlier spotted by surveillance equipment at the eastern portion of the border, known as the Demilitarised Zone, but avoided capture by South Korean troops on Saturday night. The surveillance later detected the person crossing the border, Joint Chiefs of Staff officers said.

South Korea sent a message to North Korea on Sunday morning to ensure the safety of the person, but the North hasn't responded, the officers said requesting anonymity citing department rules.

READ MORE: Victorian COVID-19 case numbers jump by almost 1500

It was unclear if this was a rare case of a South Korean hoping to defect to the North, or it could be a North Korean who briefly entered the South Korean territory for some reason before returning to the North.

In September 2020, North Korea fatally shot a South Korean fisheries official found floating in its waters along a poorly marked sea boundary. South Korea said that North Korea troops were under orders to shoot anyone illegally crossing the border to protect against the coronavirus pandemic.

READ MORE Hospitalisations jump as 20,794 new COVID-19 cases recorded in NSW

Earlier in 2020, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un placed a border city under total lockdown after a North Korean defector with COVID-19-like symptoms sneaked back home. The fate of that defector, who had lived in South Korea, is not known.

On Saturday, North Korea announced it had decided to place top priority on strict virus restrictions at a high-profile ruling party meeting last week.

READ MORE: 'Done for': Melbourne GP warns COVID-19 testing shift left too late

The two Koreas are split along the world's most heavily armed border, called the Demilitarised Zone. An estimated two million mines are peppered inside and near the 248-kilometre-long, four-kilometre-wide DMZ, which is also guarded by barbed wire fences, tank traps and combat troops on both sides.

READ MORE: Man drowns trying to rescue child who fell into waterfall

Defecting via the DMZ is rare. At the height of their Cold War rivalry, both Koreas sent agents and spies to each other's territory through the DMZ, but no such incidents have been reported in recent years.

About 34,000 North Koreans have defected to South Korea since the late 1990s to avoid poverty or political oppression, but a vast majority of them have come via China and Southeast Asian countries.

READ MORE: Large swells, dangerous winds for two states as ex-tropical cyclone bears down

North Korea has yet to report any cases of the coronavirus while experts have questioned its claim of a perfect record.

Drew Peterson, the former Chicago-area police sergeant who was convicted in 2012 of killing his third wife, is set to return to court this month after a judge agreed to hear his motion to vacate the verdict.

Will County Judge Edward Burmilla scheduled the January 21 hearing after finding a "gist of a constitutional" claim in Peterson's six-page handwritten motion, according to the Chicago Tribune.

Judge Burmilla assigned Peterson a public defender and two investigators from the public defender's office.

READ MORE: Victorian COVID-19 case numbers jump by almost 1500

READ MORE Hospitalisations jump as 20,794 new COVID-19 cases recorded in NSW

Peterson, from the Chicago suburb of Bolingbrook, is serving a 38-year prison sentence in the 2004 killing of Kathleen Savio.

He will follow that sentence with 40 more years after he was convicted in 2016 of plotting to kill the prosecutor who put him behind bars.

Ms Savio's body was found in a dry bathtub in 2004, weeks before a scheduled hearing to determine money and child custody issues related to her divorce from Peterson.

Her death was initially ruled an accident, but her remains were exhumed after the 2007 disappearance of Peterson's fourth wife, Stacy. Ms Savio's death was subsequently ruled a homicide.

Stacy Peterson is presumed dead, although her body has never been found. Drew Peterson is a suspect in her disappearance, but has never been charged.

In his motion filed in October, Peterson argues that his lead attorney, Joel Brodsky, did not provide effective counsel.

Peterson contends that Brodsky threatened other attorneys with removal from the case if they disagreed with him, and that he wanted to testify in his own defence but that Mr Brodsky would not allow it. Peterson also alleges prosecutorial misconduct and witness intimidation.

Further, he argues that two key witnesses who were allowed to testify under the state's hearsay law should not have been permitted to testify.

The Illinois Supreme Court ruled in a unanimous 2017 decision that hearsay testimony from Ms Savio and Stacy Peterson did not violate Drew Peterson's constitutional right to confront his accusers because of evidence that killed he them to prevent their testimony.

READ MORE: Large swells, dangerous winds for two states as ex-tropical cyclone bears down

The Will County State's Attorney's office said in a 23-page written response that there was no merit to Peterson's claims, and denied any misconduct or witness intimidation.

Prosecutors pointed out that the state's higher courts, including the Supreme Court, ruled against Peterson, and provided court transcripts in which he told the judge that he chose not to testify but never mentioned that Mr Brodsky prevented him from taking the witness stand.

Mr Brodsky agreed that Peterson's claims were or could have been raised in previous appeals and that higher courts have already ruled that there was nothing improper about the trial.

"There's nothing here," said Mr Brodsky, whose law licence was suspended for two years in 2019.

By RNZ People are urged to not swim in the Manawatū River in Palmerston North, after four drownings in recent days.Palmerston North City Council and police are asking people to not swim at Ahimate.A rāhui is in place…

Two people have been taken to hospital this afternoon after separate water incidents at holiday hotspots on the Coromandel Peninsula.At 1.53pm St John was called to an incident at Waihī Beach, with one ambulance, one first…

Police are appealing for further witnesses to an alleged sexual assault of a young woman in Riverton in the early hours of New Year’s Day to come forward.Police inquiries are continuing and they are appealing for anyone who was…

A young man has died after the car he was travelling in hit a kangaroo, and then swerved into a tree in Queensland.

The driver of the vehicle and two passengers had been travelling north on the Carnarvon Highway near St George, 500km west of Brisbane at around 2.30am.

READ MORE: Man in his 30s dies with 'probable COVID-19' at Gold Coast home

One of the passengers, a man in his 20s, died at the scene.

The driver and another passenger, both in their 20s, were transported to Saint George Hospital with minor injuries.

One man suffered chest pains and and cuts, and the another had injuries on his face.

The kangaroo died in the collision.

Police are investigating.

READ MORE: More beaches close as lifeguards seek to protect swimmers from wild surf

Swimmers as young as 10 up to those in their 50s have been among those rescued from northern New Zealand beaches, as temperatures soared over the weekend. A total of 18 people were rescued by lifeguards yesterday at Northern region…