The quake's magnitude was raised to 8.9 from 8.5 by the U.S. Geological Survey on its Web site, making it the strongest earthquake in 40 years. Nine aftershocks measuring between 5.8 and 7.3 spread across a zone from Sumatra to India's Andaman Islands within four hours of the initial jolt, it said.
At least 1,000 people in Sri Lanka died when tsunami waves smashed into the island, according to Agence France-Presse. Fifty- five people, mostly tourists at southern beaches, died in Thailand, Interior Ministry official Sermasak Phongphanich told reporters. More than 500 people died in southern India, and deaths were reported in Malaysia, Bangladesh and the Andamans.
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The Indonesia earthquake, which struck about 7 a.m. local time, was centered offshore about 1,605 kilometers (1,000 miles) northwest of Jakarta at a depth of 10 kilometers, the U.S. Geological Survey said. The death toll in Indonesia from flattened buildings and flash floods has risen to 100, AFP reported. Phone lines and electricity have been cut off.
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"I'm afraid the number is going to increase," Budi Waluyo, an official at the National Earthquake Center said of the death toll in Indonesia. "We are having problems communicating with people there."

Meanwhile, a powerful earthquake jolted a wide area of Bangladesh yesterday, but there were no immediate reports of casualties or damage, news reports and weather officials said.

The magnitude 7.36 temblor struck the southern port city of Chittagong, according to a statement by the Bangladesh Meteorological Department said. Bangladesh lacks equipment to determine the epicentre of the quake.

Media reports said the quake was felt in the central, southern and western parts of the country, including the capital Dhaka.

Big quakes are rare in Bangladesh, a delta nation of 140 million people in South Asia.

The Sri Lankan Government declared a state of disaster as at least 1,000 people were killed after huge waves battered the country's eastern and southern coastlines, swamping entire villages. [...]
Indian Home Minister Shivraj Patil told the Press Trust of India around 1,000 people were dead in south India. In Indonesia, government officials said at least 150 had been killed but warned they expected the death toll to rise substantially
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At least 99 people were killed and more than 1,300 were wounded in southern Thailand, with many of the deaths occurring in the idyllic tourist islands of Phuket and Phi Phi.
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In Malaysia, six people drowned and several others were missing after being swept away by a tidal wave in the north-western resort island of Penang, a popular destination with foreign tourists, police and rescue officials said.

More than 100 tourists on diving holidays are missing on islands off southern Thailand following Sunday's tsunamis, about 70 of them in the famed Emeral Cave, a tourist official said.

"We don't know whether they are dead or alive," the official told Reuters from the southern city of Trang.

The Emeral Cave, which contains a tiny white sand beach and water turned emerald by sunshine through a hole in the top, is a major attraction for divers who have to swim underwater to get into it.