Washington, Oct 21: A US military team, dubbed as “Red Team” for challenging conventional thinking over terrorism, has said that words like ‘jihad’ and ‘Islamist’ were needed in discussing terrorism in the 21st Century, and that the federal agencies that avoid these words were “soft-pedaling” the link between religious extremism and violent acts, reported the Washington Times.

According to the daily, the report titled “Freedom of Speech in Jihad Analysis: Debunking the Myth of Offensive Words” was written by unnamed civilian analysts and contractors for the US Central Command.

The Chief Executive of Google Inc., Eric Schmidt will actively hit the campaign trail this week on behalf of Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama, after having kept a low partisan profile till now, in the 2008 election.

Making the announcement in Monday’s Wall Street Journal, Schmidt said his planned endorsement of the Illinois senator is a ‘natural evolution’ from his role as an informal adviser to the Obama campaign. He noted that he has been advising the campaign on technology and clean-energy issues for most of the summer.

New York, Oct. 21 : Democratic presidential nominee and White House frontrunner Barack Obama has announced that he will suspend his campaigning for 36 hours to visit his ailing grandmother Madelyn Dunham in Hawaii.

According to the New York Times, Dunham, 85, is gravely ill. Campaign spokesman Robert Gibbs declined to specify the nature of her illness, other than to say it was quite serious. Dunham lives in Honolulu.

Yangon - Myanmar's state media on Tuesday blamed a bomb blast that killed a 26-year-old man over the weekend on the victim himself, described as a former Buddhist monk who had participated in the September 2007, "saffron revolution."

Thet Oo Win died in a bomb explosion at his home in Shwepyitha township in Yangon at 5:30 pm on Sunday.

A police investigation into the incident found various bomb-making paraphernalia including a 9-volt dry cell battery fastened with a wire, a damaged pieces of lithium battery, six electric detonators and ammonium nitrates at the victim's home, claimed The New Light of Myanmar, a military mouthpiece.

Bangkok - A Chinese-led consortium with a concession for oil exploration on Myanmar's Ramree Island has left hundreds of local islanders landless and unemployed and their environment befouled, a human rights group said Tuesday.

Blocking Freedom, a report compiled by the environmental and human rights group Arakan Oil Watch, said a consortium led by the China National Offshore Oil Company Ltd (CNOOC Ltd) left behind such a trail of abuses and environmental contamination on Ramree Island that outraged locals attacked their facilities last year.

The report was the first to be released on Chinese onshore oil exploration activities in Ramree Island, Myanmar's largest island, in Arakan State, now called Rakhine. 

London, Oct 21: Women office workers prefer spending more time with their computers than their husbands or boyfriends, reveals a new American research.

The study found that the ladies spend almost three times as much time with their computer than with their partners.

According to a poll of almost 3,000 Americans, women spend an average of 9.3 hours a day with their PC, compared with 3.6 hours with their other halves, reports the Telegraph.