When, in 1997, the International Atomic Energy Agency unanimously elected Mohamed ElBaradei as its next Director General, few observers could have forecast the dramatic role he would play over the next 12 years. Certainly, the stage onto which Dr. ElBaradei stepped - featuring Saddam Hussein's Iraq, Kim Jong-Il's North Korea, Muammar al-Gaddafi's Libya, and the Islamic Republic of Iran - gave ample opportunity for high-stakes and high-profile decision-making. But no one could have predicted that ElBaradei would be 'the man in the middle' of so many nuclear conflicts over so sustained a period of time. And after he and the IAEA were jointly awarded the 2005 Nobel Peace Prize, his role as middle-man only gained intensity. In "The Age of Deception", Dr. ElBaradei gives us his account from the centre of the nuclear fray. Readers will sit at the dinner table with Iraqi officials in Baghdad, listening as they bleakly predict the coming war. They will eavesdrop on the exchanges between UN inspectors and U.S. officials observing the behind-the-scenes formulation of an approach to foreign policy and diplomacy that would come to characterise the Bush administration. We gain a feel for the difficulty of the IAEA inspectors' struggle to maintain objectivity when trust has been broken, or when the press - or governments - are playing fast and loose with the facts. "The Age of Deception" is a story of human imperfection, of modern society struggling to come to grips with the multiple dimensions of human insecurity.

About the Author

Mohamed ElBaradei served as Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency from 1997 to 2009. Heralded for their work in limiting nuclear proliferation, ElBaradei and the IAEA were jointly awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2005. ElBaradei, who has a doctorate in International Law from the New York University School of Law, has been widely touted as a potential Egyptian presidential candidate in 2011. He lives in Cairo.

Reviews

Nobel Peace Prize laureate (2005) ElBaradei announced on March 9, 2011, his candidacy for president of Egypt; the election is scheduled for this fall. In this timely memoir, ElBaradei concentrates on the necessity of preventing the spread of nuclear weapons, especially into the hands of rogue states and terrorists, to ensure global survival. During his 12-year tenure (1997-2009) as head of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), ElBaradei was a key participant in dramatic, headline-dominating confrontations over nuclear proliferation, most famously during the IAEA inspections in Iraq, which found no violations and no nuclear weapons. ElBaradei's principal themes are the need to strengthen the mandate and standing of the IAEA; to curb "sword-waving" by the world's great powers; and to emphasize diplomacy and collective security over nuclear proliferation. There is plenty of grist in this firsthand account, which will likely be the subject of lively, serious debate within world governments. Narrator and actor David Drummond's impressive, steady reading enlivens the material; for foreign policy wonks everywhere. [See Prepub Alert, 12/6/10.]-Dale Farris, Groves, TX (c) Copyright 2011. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.