Sri Lanka's president Sunday ordered an investigation into a mass grave dating back to a period when thousands of people disappeared during a crackdown on Marxist rebels, his spokesman said.

Insurgents wearing Afghan army uniforms launched a suicide attack and stormed a courthouse Wednesday in a failed bid to free Taliban inmates, killing at least 44 people, half of them shot in the basement. Nine attackers were killed.

Police in Myanmar said they were investigating the head of a mosque and a Muslim teacher for possible negligence after a pre-dawn fire swept a religious dormitory Tuesday, killing 13 children in a blaze that raised new concern over sectarian tensions that have plagued the country since anti-Muslim violence hit the nation's heartland last month.

Bangladesh police have arrested three atheist bloggers for defaming Islam and the prophet Mohammad, police said Tuesday, amid demands from religious fundamentalists for an Internet crackdown.

Dock workers at Sri Lanka's main container port called Tuesday for a boycott of cargo from neighboring India amid worsening relations.

Privately owned daily newspapers hit Myanmar's streets Monday for the first time in decades under new freedoms that represent a revolution for a media industry which was shackled under military rule.

The Associated Press on Saturday became the first international news agency to open a bureau in Myanmar since a reformist government took power two years ago and began relaxing restrictions on the media for the first time in decades.

Sri Lanka's main Tamil party Sunday accused a pro-government mob of attacking them in the island's north as racial tensions rose after Buddhist extremists smashed a Muslim-owned business.

Two years after a repressive junta ceded power, Myanmar is grappling with a surge in religious extremism that experts trace to anti-Muslim “provocateurs” including radical Buddhist monks.

Myanmar's government on Saturday rejected remarks by a U.N. human rights official suggesting that the authorities bear some blame for recent mob attacks by Buddhists on minority Muslims that killed dozens of people.