Full Coverage: South Asia

30.03.2009 Two million Bangladeshi children are affected by acute malnutrition, says a UN survey, which warned that rising food prices are forcing many households into a spiral of debt.

27.03.2009 Tens of thousands of people trapped in "safe zones" in the north-eastern Wanni region are at increased risk from the escalation in attacks by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam and the Sri Lankan Armed Forces, said a leading international rights group.
+ Situation deteriorates as heavy rains fall
+ Tamilnet update
+ At end of Sri Lanka's long war, siege is best hope
+ No Let-Up in Army Shelling of Civilians
+ Civilians die in Sri Lanka shelling
+ Sri Lanka crisis

26.03.2009 Heavy rains have caused more hardship for an estimated 150,000 civilians trapped in fighting between government and rebels in Sri Lanka’s northern Vanni region.
+ Tamilnet update
+ At end of Sri Lanka's long war, siege is best hope
+ No Let-Up in Army Shelling of Civilians
+ Civilians die in Sri Lanka shelling
+ Sri Lanka crisis

19.03.2009 A warning about the risks to children in the Sri Lankan civil war has been given by UNICEF chief Ann M. Veneman as an international medical charity says it is negotiating provision of mental health services in a region where thousands of people are believed to be trapped by the fighting.
+ State secrets, public denials in Sri Lanka

10.03.2009 Disabled women are becoming more visible in Southeast Asia's disability movement and getting their voices heard. Kuhu Das, a disabled woman activist and director of the Association of Women with Disabilities in India, tells of her struggle and how a unique project is training disabled women to be new leaders.

09.03.2009 “I don’t want to be a martyr and get it banned and boast about it,” says actress Nandita Das of her directorial debut, Firaaq. But she was aware when making her film about people caught up in the anti-Muslim violence in Gujarat in 2002 that it might prove controversial.

09.03.2009 Our sense of values continues to rotate in the spin-dryer. On the same day that Gandhi's spectacles sell for millions, the Bank of England decides that money is worthless.

08.03.2009 William Dalrymple's book review draws interesting parallels between post-independence land reform in India and Pakistan and the contrasting path of modern literature in the two countries. Financial Times

06.03.2009 A mass campaign is needed to convince the Sinhalese majority that devolution and democratisation are in its interest as much as they are in the interest of Sri Lanka’s minorities, says Rohini Hensman.

03.03.2009 As the Sri Lankan government steps up its war with the Tamil Tigers, assaults on journalists are on the rise. So are suspicions that the government is complicit in these attacks, says Bob Dietz.

02.03.2009 About 106,000 fire-related women's deaths occurred in a single year in India - far more than was reported by police, according to a report in the medical journal, The Lancet.