Amnesty International has accused Pakistan of systematically committing human rights abuses by arresting and secretly detaining hundreds of people since the Sept. 11 attacks. Amnesty said bounty hunters — including police officers and local residents — have captured hundreds of individuals of different nationalities, often apparently at random, and sold them into US custody.

• Amnesty researcher Timothy Parrit: “Among the reports of these many hundreds of people arrested and detained in Pakistan, a substantial number have been transferred unlawfully out of Pakistan jurisdiction to U.S. and other agents and we know that some of these people arrested in Pakistan have been transferred first to Bagram in Afghanistan and then to Guantanamo.”

The British national Moazzam Begg also criticized Pakistan’s human rights record. Begg was seized from his home in Pakistan in January 2002 and then imprisoned in Afghanistan and Guantánamo Bay.

• Moazzam Begg: “Pakistan has become, almost like a 'second player' in the 'war on terror' with the United States of America in how it removes the rights, removes any civil liberties, any freedoms that one would expect, by dragging people and kidnapping them from their homes. It is little wonder then, that people in Pakistan are afraid to speak about these issues because of the fear that they themselves may disappear.”