Brazil has triggered a FIFA regulation in a bid to prevent eight players from competing for their respective clubs in the English Premier League this weekend.

They had been called up for World Cup qualifiers but didn't travel after Premier League teams had objected to their players going to South American nations, which are red-listed by the British government because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Leader Brazil and second-place Argentina will return to action in World Cup qualifiers on Thursday as fallout from the chaos of their suspended game on Sunday continues.

Just minutes into their match on Sunday, a Brazilian health official entered the pitch to remove four Argentina players he considered should be in quarantine due to COVID-19 protocols. FIFA has opened an investigation, and soccer bodies of both countries have questions to answer.

Can kids get "long COVID" after coronavirus infections?

Yes, but studies indicate they're less likely than adults to be affected by symptoms that persist, recur or begin a month or more after infection.

Rain was pouring down on the Florida Panhandle as Tropical Storm Mindy made its way across the state early Thursday morning.

The storm made landfall in St. Vincent Island, on Wednesday night. Mindy was expected to cause as much as 6 inches (15 centimeters) of rainfall across the Florida Panhandle and portions of southern Georgia and South Carolina through Thursday morning, the National Hurricane Center said. Scattered flash, urban, and small-stream floods are possible.

Civil defense forces carrying rifles and personnel wearing gas masks and red hazmat suits paraded North Korea's capital overnight in a celebration of the nation's 73rd anniversary that was a marked departure from past militaristic displays.

The parade — overseen by leader Kim Jong Un, wearing a cream suit and visibly slimmer than he was at the start of the year — centered around paramilitary organizations and public security forces protecting Pyongyang instead of the major military units that handle the most important weapons of Kim's nuclear and missile arsenal.

Germany's foreign minister arrived in Libya on Thursday to reopen the country's embassy in Tripoli.

"Today, we want to show with the reopening that Germany is and will remain a committed partner of Libya," Heiko Maas said upon his arrival in Tripoli. "We want to have a voice in the Libyan capital again."

East Mediterranean rivals Turkey and Egypt have agreed to continue talks aimed at stabilizing relations after the end of a second round of negotiations, the two governments said Wednesday.

A joint statement said that after a two-day meeting in Ankara it was agreed to extend talks, "confirming (the mutual) desire to make progress in areas under discussion and the need for further steps to facilitate normalization" of bilateral relations.

Pakistan says Qatar's foreign minister will arrive in Pakistan's capital of Islamabad to discuss the latest situation in Afghanistan.

In a statement, Pakistan's Foreign Ministry said Qatari chief diplomat Mohammad bin Abdulrahman Al Thani during his day-long visit Thursday will meet with Pakistan's foreign minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi and other top officials.

The U.S. Navy's Mideast-based 5th Fleet said Wednesday it will launch a new task force that incorporates airborne, sailing and underwater drones after years of maritime attacks linked to ongoing tensions with Iran.

Navy officials declined to identify which systems they would introduce from their headquarters on the island nation of Bahrain in the Persian Gulf. However, they promised the coming months would see the drones stretch their capabilities across a region of chokepoints crucial to both global energy supplies and worldwide shipping.

U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said Thursday the al-Qaida extremist group that used Afghanistan as a staging base to attack United States 20 years ago may attempt to regenerate there following an American withdrawal that has left the Taliban in power.

Austin spoke to a small group of reporters in Kuwait City at the conclusion of a four-day tour of Persian Gulf states. He said the United States is prepared to prevent an al-Qaida comeback in Afghanistan that would threaten the United States.