Thaindian News

Washington, Apr 21 (ANI): Greg Mortenson, the author accused of fabricating large parts of his autobiographical writings, is to be sued by the Pakistani tribesmen he claimed kidnapped him.

Greg, in his bestselling books about building schools in Pakistan and Afghanistan, tells how the Taliban kidnapped and held him hostage in Waziristan, the most dangerous part of Pakistan’s western tribal border area with Afghanistan.

A photograph in one book showed him with a dozen tribesmen, some armed, who were supposedly holding him captive.

Mansur Khan Mahsud, who is the research director of a thinktank in Islamabad that specializes in the tribal area, was featured in the photograph.

He said that Mortenson came to his village of Kot Langer Khel, in the Laddah area of South Waziristan, in July 1996 and the Taliban did not appear on the Pakistani side of the border until 2002, following the US-led invasion of Afghanistan.

“It’s lies from A to Z. There’s not one word of truth. If there had been a little exaggeration, that could have been forgiven,” the Guardian quoted Mahsud as saying.

“The way that he’s portrayed the Mahsuds, as hash-smoking bandits, is wrong. He’s defamed me, my family, my tribe. We are respected people in my area. He’s turned us into kidnappers,” he added.

Mahsud said that he had decided to file a lawsuit against Mortenson and was in contact with a lawyer in the US.

Mortenson, whose charity is now under investigation by US authorities, has defended his work, admitting to only “some omissions and compressions”. (ANI)