Nothing good can grow from an poisonous seed, and U.S. practices concerning torture, ghost detainees and extraordinary renditions are as poisonous as they come.

In the Feb. 14 edition of the New Yorker magazine, which is already available online, reporter Jane Mayer tells the story of Maher Arar, a Canadian engineer who fell victim to the United States’ disregard for international and domestic law.

According to Mayer’s story, Arar was arrested Sept. 26, 2002, because his name appeared on a terrorist watch list. He was held for 13 days before being clandestinely transferred to Syria, a country that is often criticized by the United States for its support of terrorism and violations of human rights.

During more than a year in custody, Arar was subjected to beatings, kept in an underground, windowless cell and repeatedly threatened with death. Under the intense pressure, Arar says he admitted being a terrorist and said anything that he thought his captors wanted to hear. In October 2003, he was released after the Canadian government intervened. Syria’s ambassador in Washington, Mayer wrote, announced that his country had found no links between Arar and terrorism. An innocent man was held – and abused – for more than a year for no reason.

He was never given a trial or allowed to contest his arrest in any way. Now he’s suing the U.S. government for essentially outsourcing his torture to another country.

The process, called extraordinary renditions, allows the government to secretly ship prisoners to other countries for detention and questioning. U.S. and international law forbid the practice if there is reason to suspect that the prisoner would be tortured. Nonetheless, prisoners are being sent to countries such as Syria, Egypt and Morocco, all of which are known to use torture.

There are no solid figures on the number of people who have been arrested by the United States here at home or around the world and delivered to these surrogate nations for questioning. The government refused to answer questions posed by Mayer and members of Congress. Like the ghost detainees held by the CIA, these people simply disappear into an “extra-legal” system almost completely shielded from scrutiny.

What is the justification for discarding the rule of law? Prying a false confession from a wrongly arrested Canadian?

President Bush has said that torture is never acceptable. If only he meant it.