Chris McGillion

People are turning up dead for no apparent reason on the East Timor side of the border with Indonesia. Authorities believe a supply of toxic liquor smuggled into the country from West Timor is the reason. But traditional villagers fear a more sinister cause: a spirit that's taken possession of a living person in order to extract revenge for a past incident that occurred in defense of a sacred site. A suspicion of graft complicates matters and, if proved, could be tied to either explanation for the deaths. FBI agent Sara Carter, on assignment for INTERPOL in the border region of Balibo, is drawn into a tangled web where a small-time crook, a swindler, and people steeped in superstition combine to make a volatile cocktail of ambition and fear as deadly as the illicit liquor. The investigation will cost her friend Timorese police investigator Vincintino Cordero dearly, cause a re-evaluation of her own feelings about loss and love, and put Carter's own life in danger.

Timorese police investigator Vincintino Cordero is assigned the case of two youths, rival gang members, found a week apart with their throats slit and a betel quid placed in their mouths. The case distracts him from spending time with FBI Agent Sara Carter before she completes her INTERPOL assignment and heads home to Arizona. But Carter is facing distractions of her own as the US ambassador and INTERPOL's director pressure her to stay in East Timor. When the fianc of her friend, police officer Estefana dos Carvalho, goes missing, all signs point to his abduction by whoever is behind the murder of the gang members. That draws Carter into Cordero's investigation where the stakes, like the dangers, rise. A gang war could be imminent like that which tore the new nation of East Timor apart eight years earlier. Or young Timorese could be acting out a cult leader's prophecy that those who fought and died for the country's independence will rise from their graves and win a more favourable victory if the right conditions are met. Which of these possibilities do the betel quids in the dead

An agnostic Catholic priest and an old woman believed to be a witch become key to FBI Agent Sara Carter and her Timorese police colleague, Vincintino Cordero, unraveling the truth behind an historic mass killing, a more recent murder, and the death of a traditional village leader who used superstition to mask his greed

FBI Agent Sara Carter is mourning the fact that her father was killed trying to stop the abduction of her half sister years before. It's the reason she became a police officer and the reason for her robust policing style. When that style becomes a problem for her resident agent in charge, she is forced to accept a secondment to Interpol in East Timor. There she is assigned to investigate the abduction of babies in the mountains along the country's southern border with Indonesia. Interpol has reason to believe an international racket is involved.

This book is the first comprehensive study of the Reagan administration's policy toward the military dictatorship of General Augusto Pinochet in Chile. Based on new primary and archival materials, as well as on original interviews with former US and Chilean officials, it traces the evolution of Reagan policy from an initial 'close embrace' of the junta to a re-evaluation of whether Pinochet was a risk to long-term US interests in Chile and, finally, to an acceptance in Washington of the need to push for a return to democracy. It provides fresh insights into the bureaucratic conflicts that were a key part of the Reagan decision-making process and reveals not only the successes but also the limits of US influence on Pinochet's regime. Finally, it contributes to the ongoing debate about the US approach toward democracy promotion in the Third World over the past half century.

This book is the first comprehensive study of the Reagan administration's policy toward the military dictatorship of General Augusto Pinochet in Chile. Based on new primary and archival materials, as well as on original interviews with former US and Chilean officials, it traces the evolution of Reagan policy from an initial 'close embrace' of the junta to a re-evaluation of whether Pinochet was a risk to long-term US interests in Chile and, finally, to an acceptance in Washington of the need to push for a return to democracy. It provides fresh insights into the bureaucratic conflicts that were a key part of the Reagan decision-making process and reveals not only the successes but also the limits of US influence on Pinochet's regime. Finally, it contributes to the ongoing debate about the US approach toward democracy promotion in the Third World over the past half century.

English summary: The Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse has focused more public attention on the Catholic Church in... German description:

The first comprehensive study of US policy towards Cuba in the post-Cold War era. Drawing on interviews with Bush and Clinton policymakers, congressional participants in the policy debate, and leaders of the anti-sanctions business community, it makes an important original contribution to our knowledge of the evolution of American policy during this period. This study argues that Bush and Clinton operated within the same Cold War framework that shaped the Cuba policy of their predecessors. But it also demonstrates that US policy after 1989 was driven principally by the imperatives of domestic politics. The authors show how Bush and Clinton corrupted the policymaking process by subordinating rational decisionmaking in the national interest to narrow political calculations. The result was the pursuit of a policy that had nothing to do with its stated objectives of promoting reforms in Cuba and everything to do with getting rid of Fidel Castro’s regime.

The first comprehensive study of US policy towards Cuba in the post-Cold War era. Drawing on interviews with Bush and Clinton policymakers, congressional participants in the policy debate, and leaders of the anti-sanctions business community, it makes an important original contribution to our knowledge of the evolution of American policy during this period. This study argues that Bush and Clinton operated within the same Cold War framework that shaped the Cuba policy of their predecessors. But it also demonstrates that US policy after 1989 was driven principally by the imperatives of domestic politics. The authors show how Bush and Clinton corrupted the policymaking process by subordinating rational decisionmaking in the national interest to narrow political calculations. The result was the pursuit of a policy that had nothing to do with its stated objectives of promoting reforms in Cuba and everything to do with getting rid of Fidel Castro’s regime.