Indian Premier Narendra Modi has arrived in Sri Lanka on a brief visit that New Delhi says emphasizes his "neighborhood-first policy." China is also trying to exert its influence in both Sri Lanka and the Maldives.

Sri Lanka's top police inspector and a former defense secretary have been arrested for failing to avert blasts that killed more than 250 people in April. Prosecutors accused the men of grave negligence.

Violent incidents marred Sri Lanka's presidential election; gunmen fired at a bus transporting Muslim voters to the polls. This only magnified national security as a top priority for the 16 million eligible voters.

Sri Lankan will elect a new president on Saturday, months after the April attacks jilted confidence in the government. Despite 35 contenders running, the vote will likely be dominated by two prominent candidates.

Gotabaya Rajapaksa, who led the government's takedown of the Tamil Tigers a decade ago, has been declared the winner of the presidential election. Despite outbursts of violence, election turnout was at a record high.

The first anniversary of Sri Lanka's 2019 Easter Sunday bombings has been marked with silence and bells amid its coronavirus curfew. Suspected Islamist attackers killed 268 people, Catholic and Protestant, and tourists.

A group of Sri Lankan rescuers have returned more than 100 whales to the sea after a mass beaching of the mammals. A team made up of the Sri Lanka navy and coast guard and local residents worked overnight to save 100 to 120 stranded short-finned pilot whales on Panadura Beach, according to the country's navy.

A riot at a Sri Lankan jail has left at least eight inmates dead and more than 50 injured. Prisoners had been protesting over surging coronavirus infections in the country's overcrowded facilities.

The violent clashes broke out after prisoners vented their anger over coronavirus-related conditions at a high-security prison located near Colombo. Eleven people have since died, with over 100 wounded in the riots.

An England cricket fan who waited 10 months in Sri Lanka to watch his team play is escorted away by police before a ball had been bowled in the first Test. Rob Lewis, who decided to stay in the country after the original tour was aborted over the coronavirus last March, tried to watch the game from the historic ramparts of Galle Fort, a vantage point which overlooks the city's cricket ground. But he was ordered off there just after the national anthems. The game was held behind closed doors because of the pandemic.

The child died in hospital after being beaten during a suspected exorcism. The girl's mother and the exorcist have been charged in connection with the death.

The authorities in Buddhist-majority Sri Lanka pledged to close over 1,000 Islamic schools and formally ban burqas. The government also granted itself powers to detain suspects for "deradicalization."