Pakistan, US to form joint anti-terror team

The United States and Pakistan are trying to bandage their relationship by forging a new joint intelligence team to go after top terrorism suspects, officials say. The move comes after Secretary of State Hillary Clinton presented the Pakistanis with the US list of most-wanted terrorism targets, US and Pakistani officials said on Wednesday. The list includes some groups the Pakistanis have been reluctant to attack, US officials said. It's one of a host of confidence-building measures meant to restore trust blown on both sides after US forces tracked down and killed Osama Bin Laden during a secret raid in Pakistan last month. But it also amounts to a new test of loyalty for both sides. The Pakistanis say the US has failed to share its best intelligence, instead running numerous unilateral spying operations on its soil. US officials say they need to see the Pakistanis target militants they've long sheltered, including the Haqqani network, which operates with impunity in the Pakistani tribal areas while attacking US troops in Afghanistan. All those interviewed spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss matters of intelligence. The US and Pakistan have engaged in a diplomatic stare-down since the May 2 raid, with the Pakistanis outraged over the unilateral action as an affront to its sovereignty and the Americans angry to find that Bin Laden had been hiding for more than five years in a military town just 50km from the capital, Islamabad. The US deliberately hid the operation from Pakistan, recipient of billions in counter-terrorism aid, for fear that the operation would leak to militants. A series of high-level US visits has aimed to take the edge off. Marc Grossman, the special representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan, and CIA deputy director Mike Morell met with intelligence chief Lieutenant-General Ahmad Shuja Pasha last month. Last week, the secretary of state and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs, Admiral Mike Mullen, held a day of intensive meetings with top Pakistani military and civilian officials. After that outreach, Pakistan allowed the CIA to re-examine the Bin Laden compound last Friday. Pakistan also returned the tail section of a US stealth helicopter that broke off when the SEALs blew up the aircraft to destroy secret noise-and radar-deadening technology. The CIA has also shared some information gleaned from the raid, and Pakistan has reciprocated, US and Pakistani officials said on Wednesday. The investigative team will be made up mainly of intelligence officers from both nations, according to two US officials and one Pakistani official. From / Gulf News