The steep decline in Asian exports — 27% in China, 44% in Taiwan, 35% in Singapore and 34% in South Korea — has raised alarms over the region’s overdependence on export-driven growth.

What policy, industry and cultural shifts are needed to develop an alternative to Asia’s export-driven growth model?

In partnership with the World Economic Forum, CNN hosts this discussion. The panel includes:

-Hoang Trung Hai, Deputy Prime Minister of Vietnam
-Koji Miyahara, Chairman, Nippon Yusen Kabushiki Kaisha (NYK Line), Japan
-Kiat Sittheeamorn, President of Thailand Trade Representative
-Zhao Qizheng, Chairman, Foreign Affairs Committee, National Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), People’s Republic of China

Chaired by Andrew Stevens, Anchor and Correspondent, CNN International, Hong Kong SAR

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Juan Carlos Zarate, a senior advisor on terrorism at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, joins Daljit Dhaliwal to discuss strategies in the fight against terrorism. He says that in some cases, the Obama administration has actually been more aggressive than the Bush administration in fighting the so-called war on terror.

More on the killing of Saleh ali Saleh Nabhan in Somalia from CNN:

Somalia said a senior al Qaeda operative tied to several attacks in East Africa was killed Monday in a U.S. strike in southern Somalia.

Intelligence sources have confirmed to the Somali government that Saleh ali Saleh Nabhan was killed, Information Minister Dahir Mohamud Gelle said Tuesday.

“We welcome that attack because those people targeted were murderers, and they are unwanted and unwelcome in Somalia,” Gelle said.

Nabhan’s death will have “a major impact” on al Qaeda’s operations in the Horn of Africa, according to one regional analyst.

U.S. special operations forces used a helicopter to fire on a car Monday in southern Somalia, killing several people, including one they believed was Nabhan, U.S. officials told CNN earlier.

Nabhan, 30, was born in Kenya and had been tied to attacks that included the 1998 bombings of the U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, according to the sources. More than 200 were killed, and 4,000 wounded in those attacks, most of them Kenyans.

The United States targeted Nabhan in an airstrike in southern Somalia near the Kenyan border in March 2008, U.S. officials said at the time.

In February 2006, the FBI announced that Nabhan was wanted for questioning in connection with the 2002 suicide bombing of an Israeli-owned hotel and the unsuccessful attack on an Israeli charter jet in Mombasa, Kenya.

Ten Kenyans and three Israelis — including two children — were killed when three suicide bombers detonated a car bomb outside Mombasa’s Paradise Hotel in November 2002.

The bombing took place within minutes of an unsuccessful missile attack on an Israeli charter jet, which was taking off with 261 passengers and 10 crew members.

President Obama signed off on Monday’s operation, a senior U.S. official said. The United States had been monitoring the situation for days and had intelligence that Nabhan was in the area, the U.S. officials said.

The officials who talked to CNN are familiar with the latest information on Monday’s strike but did not want to be identified because they were not authorized to talk to the media.

The U.S. helicopter flew from a U.S. Navy warship offshore, while the ship kept watch on the operation, one of the sources said. The warship was ready to rescue the American troops if they got into trouble.

Farmers in the southeastern town of Barawe, Somalia, said they witnessed the assault. They said helicopters attacked a car and its occupants and that at least two people died. The witnesses said some helicopters landed and that some of the injured or dead were pulled into at least one helicopter.

A U.S. official said the troops landed to take away the body believed to be that of Nabhan for positive identification.

Nabhan is believed to be an associate of al Qaeda member Harun Fazul, who was indicted in the 1998 bombings of the U.S. embassies.

The U.S. military has long sought Nabhan because he is believed to be deeply involved in al Qaeda’s East African operations, a senior U.S. official said last year.

“He was certainly one of the leading al Qaeda figures in East Africa,” said Rashid Abdi, a Somalia analyst for the International Crisis Group, an independent advisory and analysis organization.

Nabhan “has been living in the shadows” in Somalia and not much is known about his recent activity, Abdi said.

“The fact that he is now out of the picture will have a bigger impact on al Qaeda than on Al-Shabaab,” he said, referring to the Islamist militia in Somalia that has ties to al Qaeda. “He is a man with an important organizational memory, and if a key figure like him is killed, it always has a major impact.”

Al-Shabaab is waging a bloody battle against Somalia’s transitional government and is on the U.S. list of terrorist organizations because of its al Qaeda ties.

There are growing concerns that Somalia could be the next base for al Qaeda as U.S. forces pound their positions in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

CIA Director Leon Panetta recently said the intelligence agency is keeping tabs on the region as a possible destination for fleeing al Qaeda operatives.

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Super Ladies is a documentary film that follows three Ugandan female rally-drivers, competing to beat their male counterparts in The Pearl of Africa Rally – one of Africa’s toughest motor races. The three women, Rose, Susan and Leila, exemplify changing gender dynamics in Africa – and not just on the racecourse: businesswomen, pop-singers, teachers & mothers, they also have to battle for the respect of their male competitors.

The three “Super Ladies” face the double challenge of achieving sporting success while fighting prejudice and sexism in the male world of motor rallying. The independent film Super Ladies offers a fascinating insight into the heart of modern Uganda.

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Yukio Hatoyama has assumed power in Japan after winning last month’s election and unseating the long-governing LDP. In Washington, Secretary of Clinton expressed confidence in the strength of the US-Japan relationship. This story from Agence France-Presse:

US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton expressed confidence on Wednesday that US-Japan ties will withstand the test of any policy changes introduced by the new government in Tokyo.

New Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama wants a less subservient relationship with the United States, which has stationed troops in Japan since World War II and has traditionally counted Tokyo among its staunchest allies.

The chief US diplomat told reporters at the State Department that it is only normal to expect the new center-left Democratic Party of Japan government would adopt new policies and new approaches.

“It’s a change which is dramatic given 50 years of LDP (Liberal Democratic Party) governmental leadership,” said Clinton who spoke during talks with Bangladesh’s foreign minister Dipu Moni.

“But I am very confident that the strength of our relationship and our alliance will stand the test of any political changes,” she said.

Her spokesman Ian Kelly told reporters earlier that Kurt Campbell, the assistant secretary of state for east Asia and Pacific affairs, would leave for Japan later Wednesday for talks with members of the new government.

“The United States looks forward to early and close consultations with the new Japanese government on a wide range of bilateral, regional and global issues,” Kelly added.

Neither Kelly nor Clinton disclosed whom Campbell would meet and what the agenda would be.

But Clinton said Campbell and other US officials would meet with their counterparts in the new government, some of whom they know in their previous roles, and would address any concerns it has.

Hatoyama, Japan’s new center-left prime minister, marked a turning point in history Wednesday as he took command of Asia’s biggest economy with a pledge to return power to the people.

The 62-year-old scion of a political dynasty was installed by parliament a fortnight ago after his DPJ ended more than half a century of conservative dominance in a stunning election landslide.

After naming his cabinet ministers, whose top priority is recovery from Japan’s worst post-war economic recession, Hatoyama said he also wanted to redress the nation’s long subservience to US foreign policy.

Hatoyama is due to meet world leaders including Obama, Chinese President Hu Jintao and other world leaders at the United Nations General Assembly and climate change talks in New York next week, and at the G20 talks in Pittsburgh.

On the sidelines of the global gatherings, Hatoyama is arranging his first face-to-face meeting with Obama, where he will have to balance the demands of Japan’s traditional US ally with that of his supporters at home.

Left-leaning DPJ members and coalition partners have strongly pushed for a reduction of the 47,000-strong US troop presence in Japan.

The DPJ has also long argued that Japan should not be part of “American wars” and has said it will end a Japanese naval refueling mission in the Indian Ocean in support of US-led forces in Afghanistan.

Kelly, the State Department spokesman, said the United States “looked forward” to talks on these two issues.

“We hope that they continue to make a contribution to the effort in Afghanistan. But they have to decide what that contribution will consist of,” he added.

The US-Japan alliance “remains a cornerstone of peace and security in Asia,” Kelly said, adding: “We have every expectation that our bilateral relations and global partnership will flourish with the new government.”

Clinton, who visited LDP-governed Japan in February in the first stop on her first overseas tour, underscored the point.

“I’m relaxed and optimistic that the strength of our relationship will be as positive as it ever has been and our core values remain unchanged,” she said.

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Sergio Fajardo habla en Casa de America sobre: la reelección, el Referendo y su empeño en seguir adelante para llegar a la presidencia en el 2010.

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Colombia’s intelligence agency is at the centre of a scandal after revelations that it spied on – and is still spying on – critics of the government. Documents reveal that Colombia’s department of security, known as DAS, targeted individuals including opposition party members, journalists and priests of the Catholic church.

More from Semana Internacional:

Recent findings by the Prosecutor’s office and the Inspector General’s office reveal how Colombia’s intelligence agency (DAS) became the tip of the dagger for the regime’s unlawful political war. Evidence of wiretapping, family surveillance, mail interception and infringement of private matters, are all part of the artillery that was used against those considered “enemies” by the government.

In the midst of a murder wave during the late eighties, Colombian president Virgilio Barco, attributed every new crime to “dark forces”, coining a phrase that would be used in years to come. It was used to explain terrorist attacks and massacres in the nineties and the death of many trade unionists in the first years of this century. Many human rights organizations never believed the government’s position, which stated that all these atrocities happened without their consent. These NGO’s affirmed, year after year, that public officials and government agents were part of these so-called “dark-forces”. Accomplices, they said, in a political war against the leftist opposition. They were not talking necessarily about murders but of harassment, surveillance and serious threats.

The recent investigation carried out by the Prosecutor’s Office involving the wiretappings by Colombia’s intelligence agency (DAS) prove their accusations were not unfounded. CTI, a department of the Prosecutor’s office specialized in technical investigation, found thousands of documents and folders from a group called G-3. What was interesting, at first glance, was that the Special Intelligence Group # 3 did not appear in the organization’s structure nor did it have an instruction manual. There were also blown away by the content of the files which described in a very detailed manner, the persecution carried out on important human rights activists and opposition leaders during 2004 and 2005—the last two years of Jorge Noguera’s leadership at the agency.

There were budget requests for operations against specific “targets” and intelligence reports on members of NGO’s—including papers recovered from the trash can, just like in the case of Alirio Uribe, member of a law and human rights collective. The G-3’s obsession with Alirio Uribe, no relation to President Uribe, is evident and frightening: included in his files are pictures of his wife and children, bank statements, trips abroad, emails and even a psychological profile.

Alirio Uribe is not the only one. G-3’s list of targets looks like a “Who’s who” in the world of human rights organizations. They didn’t limit themselves to local NGO’s; Jose Miguel Vivanco, head of Human Rights Watch for Latin America, had his email intercepted; his assistant’s too. It was also recommended they apply “offensive intelligence” against him. This is not just a passing mention; it is one of the tasks assigned to G-3 in a meeting held on july 25 2005.

Even though this secret group was not officially part of DAS, it had authority over other departments and had a free budget. As stated in a document dated March 8, 2005, this “monster” was created by Jorge Noguera and Jose Miguel Narváez—an external advisor for the agency and later its deputy director.

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