March 30, 2008	Sunday	Rabi-ul-Awwal 21, 1429

TORKHAM (Afghanistan), March 29: Afghan, Nato and Pakistan officials on Saturday opened the first of six intelligence-sharing centres to be dotted along the nations’ troubled border to boost anti-terrorism efforts.

The centre opened in key Afghan border town Torkham, and the others, will improve coordination between Afghanistan, Pakistan and Nato’s International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in the fight against extremists, they said.

“Today we are opening a centre where our brothers from the Pakistani army and Afghan army will be sitting, sharing information with each other,” Afghan defence ministry operational chief Sher Mohammad Karimi said.

“They will be coordinating efforts and war against terrorists. They will be reporting to their respective commanders on both sides of the borders so they can plan and coordinate operations,” he said.

Attacks by Taliban and other factions span the porous and rugged frontier with regular deadly suicide blasts and other bombings on both sides by extremist militants. The violence has tested relations between the Islamic neighbours, each saying the other should do more to end the fundamentalist violence.

A key problem is the movement of militants across the border, which the new centres are expected to monitor. After complaints from Afghanistan, Pakistan threatened last year to fence or mine part of the frontier.

Military commanders from both nations meet regularly with ISAF commanders in a tripartite commission and they work together in an intelligence-sharing hub opened in the Afghan capital Kabul in January last year.

This work would be enhanced by the new border centres, with three each due on either side of the border, said US General David Rodriguez, head of the US-led coalition force that helped to topple the Taliban.

“This facility represents a great opportunity to move forward on our common mission,” he said at an opening ceremony in Torkham.—AFP