Newark

( US) Americans living and working in New Jerseys largest city were subjected to surveillance as part of the New York Police Departments effort to build databases of where Muslims work, shop and pray, AP reports.

The operation in Newark was so secretive even the citys mayor says he was kept in the dark.

For months in mid- 2007, plainclothes officers from the NYPDs Demographics Units fanned out across Newark, taking pictures and eavesdropping on conversations inside businesses owned or frequented by Muslims.

The result was a 60- page report, obtained by AP, containing brief summaries of businesses and their clientele.

Police also photographed and mapped 16 mosques, listing them as " Islamic Religious Institutions." The report cited no evidence of terrorism or criminal behaviour. It was a guide to Newarks Muslims.

According to the report, the operation was carried out in collaboration with the Newark Police Department, which at the time was run by a former high- ranking NYPD official. But Newarks mayor, Cory Booker, said he never authorised the spying and was never told about it.

" Wow," he said as the AP laid out the details of the report.

" This raises a number of concerns. Its just very, very sobering." Police conducted similar operations outside their jurisdiction in New Yorks Suffolk and Nassau counties on suburban Long Island, according to police records.

Such surveillance has become commonplace in New York City in the decade since the 2001 terrorist attacks.

Police have built databases showing where Muslims live, where they buy groceries, even what Internet cafes they use and where they watch sports.

Dozens of mosques and student groups have been infiltrated and police have built detailed profiles of ethnic communities, from Moroccans to Egyptians to Albanians.

The documents obtained by the AP show, for the first time in any detail, how those efforts stretched outside the NYPDs jurisdiction.

New Jersey and Long Island residents had no reason to suspect the NYPD was watching them. And since the NYPD isn't accountable to their votes or tax dollars, those non- New Yorkers had little recourse to stop it.