New York  - The world's fresh water is a finite commodity, but growing demands for it are tearing the world apart between those who call for a human right for water and others who uphold water privatization in order to better serve communities around the world.

Next week in Istanbul, the Turkish government will host a World Water Forum to discuss the increasing problems of fresh water in a world where the population is growing and consumers in developing countries are driving more demands on water.

Activists called for enabling water access as a human right, claiming that the forum is geared to strengthen water privatization at the expense of those deprived of access to daily fresh water.

Recent study revealed that strained marriage affects health of women more adversely as compared to men. Research team led by Nancy Henry of the University of Utah analyzed data collected from 276 couples who had been married for an average of 20 years in which men and women aged between 40 and 70 years.

Study subjects filled questionnaires having various question related to their martial life and relationship. Researchers also carried out medical screening that included blood tests and measurements of blood pressure and waist circumference.

London, Mar 5: Reading a book is what appeals to UK teens more than speaking to their friends on social networks or other online sites, according to a new survey.

The survey has revealed that almost 50 percent of UK''s under-16s would rather read books than log on to websites to chat with their friends.

On the eve of World Book Day, the survey revealed an increased appetite for literature across all ages.

In commenting on the ghastly attack on the Sri Lankan cricketers, the media in Pakistan has followed two broad trends. Either there are disgust and remorse at the whole thing, especially because friendly foreigners are involved or there is finger-pointing at India for being behind the dastardly incident. "Is this the way we treat our esteemed guests," is the general theme of an editorial in Dawn, the country's leading English newspaper. A noble thought, but one that does not ring true.

The controversy and confusion over H1B visas has exercised both India and the United States for much of last year. The focus so far has mainly been on the US trying to protect its own citizens' jobs and thereby foiling the hopes of many Indians. But a new study on immigration from the universities of Duke, Harvard and Berkeley, led by Indian-American technology entrepreneur Vivek Wadhwa and released by the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation, has given the issue of immigrants a whole new spin. The study says that over 100,000 Indians and as many Chinese will leave the US in the next three to five years and go back home because of better job opportunities and quality of life, but primarily because of the US's arrogant immigration policies.

Sometimes you get a better sense of the road ahead by looking into the rear-view mirror. Imagine for a minute that you could be transported to the America of the early 1930s. It was a period of extreme economic grimness in the US and around the world; the economies of most big industrialised countries contracted sharply, banks collapsed in a heap, stock markets tanked, factories shut down en masse, and unemployment lines and soup-kitchen queues grew long.