Barack Obama pummeled Mitt Romney as "all over the map" on foreign policy, dismissing his "wrong and reckless" leadership in a heated final debate of a knife-edge White House race.

Data from the Department of Statistics showed that the consumer price index (CPI) for all items rose to 4.7 per cent in September, from the 3.9 per cent in August.

Three people have been killed in a fresh outbreak of communal violence in Myanmar's western Rakhine state, a local official said on Tuesday.

US presidential candidate Mitt Romney dismissed suggestions that he would start a trade war with China as he and President Barack Obama both vowed a firm line with Beijing.

World cycling officials said they could make reforms as early as this week in the wake of ratifying a life ban for global cycling icon Lance Armstrong.

US computing giant Microsoft on Tuesday gave an early peek to the key Chinese market of its new tablet computer and Windows 8 software, promising a "fast and fluid" operating system.

Philippe Labbe, the executive chef at the Shangri-La hotel in Paris, has been named France's chef of the year by the influential Gault Millau restaurant guide.

"Top Gun" director Tony Scott had traces of anti-depressant and sleep-inducing drugs in his body when he killed himself by jumping from a California bridge, coroners said Monday.