Kidnapped Americans staff face lie-detectors

Warren Weinstein, 70, country director for US-based consultancy J.E. Austin Associates, was snatched by eight gunmen who tricked their way past his guards and forced his driver to wake him up before dawn on Saturday.He was struck on the head with a pistol and driven off, apparently without witnesses, in a wealthy neighbourhood of the eastern city of Lahore where previous kidnappings of Westerners were practically unheard of.Police have so far been clueless who kidnapped him and why, other than concluding that he was targeted because of his nationality.We have decided to conduct lie-detector tests on the security guards and the driver to verify their statements given to investigators, senior police official Atif Hayat told a news agency.From today, we will start their screening. We are also interrogating the security company officials responsible for his security, Hayat said.We are questioning all those who served at his office in the past, he added.The staff are under suspicion partly because Weinstein was taken just two days before he was due to leave Pakistan after seven years, raising the possibility that his movements may have been leaked to the kidnappers.