A fire has destroyed much of Shuri Castle, a World Heritage site on Japan's southern island of Okinawa, with its main hall reduced to a skeleton.
Television footage showed firefighters still battling flames at the multi-structured, wooden castle this morning. Emergency responders received the first call about the fire around 2.47am (1.47am in Malaysia), public broadcaster NHK said
A popular tourist attraction, Shuri was built more than 500 years ago as the royal castle of the Ryukyu Kingdom.
The fire tore through the castle in the middle of its annual mid-autumn festival. It had been scheduled to be included as a stop on the 2020 Tokyo Olympic torch relay route.
(Reuters)