Witnesses question school-building author's claims

A mountaineer-philanthropist who shot into the best-seller lists with a book detailing his efforts to build girls' schools in remote villages of Pakistan and Afghanistan fudged many facts and has exaggerated his charity work, claims a documentary by CBS News to be broadcast in the United States today.

A reporter for 60 Minutes will say pages of the inspirational book Three Cups of Tea, published in 2006 by Penguin, are shot through with distortions, and that author Greg Mortenson has claimed credit for some schools that appear to have been built by someone else or do not exist at all.

Mortenson, 53, whose Central Asia Institute has claimed to have provided schooling for 60,000 girls, is countering the charges, which include questions over the probity of his financial relationship with the charity.

He suggests those making the charges are doing so for television ratings. The result could be "devastating for tens of thousands of girls", he told the Bozeman Daily Chronicle - his local newspaper in Montana.

After selling only conservative numbers in hardback, Three Cups of Tea took off in paperback, selling more than three million copies worldwide. CBS also questions whether money raised by the institute ostensibly for new schools may have gone to promoting the book, including private jet travel for Mortenson.

Arguably, the most compelling section of the book - that Mortenson stumbled on the village of Korphe, where his mission to build schools began, after becoming lost while attempting to climb the mountain K2, - is also one of its most fanciful.

CBS cites local porters who were with Mortenson saying his first encounter with Korphe and subsequent love affair with its inhabitants never happened, at least not on that trip.

Among the doubters is Jon Krakauer, a fellow writer-adventurer whose biggest book is Into Thin Air. He says he heard stories suggesting Mortenson's version of being taken in by the people of Korphe was essentially made up. It was "a beautiful story" but also "a lie", Krakauer asserts.

Also questioned by CBS is a story of being kidnapped in 1996 by Taleban fighters. Contacted by CBS, one fighter said they did no such thing. The writer's version was "totally false", and was made up "to sell his book".

Mortenson has claimed his institute has built 173 schools in the two countries and - having raised US$23.7 million last year - is in a position to build a further 63 schools a year.

However, in his Chronicle interview, he appears to concede that he had conflated reality about when and how he first visited Korphe, suggesting it did not happen during the K2 expedition. He said he and his co-author agreed at times to "simplify the sequence of events".

- INDEPENDENT