Amnesty International accuses Pakistan, the West's close ally in the war on terror, of detaining hundreds of terror suspects illegally. Some of those suspects were subjected to the other t-word.

An excerpt from the BBC story:

Pakistan denies torture, but detentions without legal process are taking place, a government spokesman told the BBC.

The report comes while the Pakistani leader is visiting the UK.

Some of the missing, says Amnesty, were known al-Qaeda suspects, but others included women and children.

A government spokesman told the BBC that the attacks of 11 September 2001 had required new measures to be taken.

He denied the allegations of torture and enforced disappearances.

President Pervez Musharraf had earlier denounced a British Ministry of Defence (MoD) research paper that accused Pakistani security forces of indirectly helping al-Qaeda and the Afghan Taleban.

Enforced disappearances were almost unheard of in Pakistan before the start of the US-led war on terror Angelika Pathak Amnesty International

After two hours of talks with Prime Minister Tony Blair on Thursday, a UK government spokesman said Gen Musharraf had accepted assurances that the document did not represent government policy.

The accusations in Amnesty's report are based in part on testimony from former detainees at the US military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, who have since been released without charge.

Evidence from the families of those who have disappeared was also used.

The report says the clandestine nature of the detentions means it is impossible to know how many are still being held in secret locations.