werld.NET

This should be required reading for anyone interesting in finding out where the 'war on terror' is going dreadfully wrong. Instead of our intelligence and police resources being used to track radicals with violent intentions they are, in many cases, being used to investigate how our own institutions are being used to illegally and secretly detain, kidnap and transport 'terror' suspects. And the word 'suspect', in many cases, being used very loosely.

I first became concerned over this issue when news broke about a Canadian citizen, Maher Arar, was kidnapped from JFK airport in New York and 'rendered' to Syria where he was tortured for 10 months. If that wasn't bad enough, I hear that the intelligence agency and national police force of his own country (and my own) was directly involved in his coming to this horrendous predicament. This scandal represented a definite low point in the pride I've ever felt as a Canadian citizen. In the aftermath of this travesty, further, the heads of these organisations have the nerve to deny culpability. The story of how Arar was abducted by the CIA can be found in chapter 3 of this book. Unfortunately, he was not alone in suffering this unthinkable ordeal nor was Canada the sole spineless conspirator in this international criminal enterprise. Stories of British, Swedish, German and Italian residents citizens and asylum-seekers hunted down and disappeared by a team of black-masked CIA agents should shock and appall anyone concerned with human rights or even the sanctity of national sovereignty.

The author, Stephen Grey, is a master investigative journalist and this book shows the stunning results of someone willing to dig for truth where very little is evident. Starting with the registration number of a mysterious executive business jet he pieces together a startling story of government sponsored kidnapping, secret prisons and torture. Read it and weep.