News analysis: Pakistan leaders confident in intelligence sharing agreement with Afghanistan

Pakistani leaders are confident that a recently signed agreement with the spy agency of Afghanistan will boost intelligence sharing cooperation to deal more effectively with the activities of the militant groups in the rugged mountainous border region.

Security officials said last week that the Afghan National Directorate of Security (NDS) and the Pakistan Inter-Services Intelligence or ISI have inked a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) as part of their fast growing cooperation in multiple areas.

The accord reflects the efforts of politicians and officials of the two uneasy neighbors that are helping bridge the trust gap and boosting cooperating in security areas. Both had previously been involved in a traditional blame game that had affected their cooperation to jointly fight the Taliban and other armed groups.

The ISI-NDS agreement will enable the monitoring of the cross- border movement of the Taliban and other militants, which have long been a major problem. The militants take advantage of the nearly 2,500 kilometers of porous border to cross to either side of the border if security forces launch a defensive operation on a particular side. But the intelligence-sharing agreement can now track down the militants even on difficult terrain.

Officials believe the agreement will also help both countries to curb narcotics smuggling as the drug cartel use the complicated border for smuggling, which is also a common challenge for the neighboring countries.

Pakistan and Afghanistan have long been accusing each other of sheltering militants, however with a visible improvement in relations, they are now not manipulating the media and are pursuing the policy of addressing numerous bilateral issues.

Both countries have created five levels of cooperation, at the border level, at the higher military level, intelligence level, security level and also the political level.

The intelligence cooperation is an anti-terrorist effort aimed at combating the extremists' movement from Pakistan to Afghanistan and from Afghanistan to Pakistan.

Security forces of the two countries will undertake coordinated operations so militants are prevented from fleeing to the other side of the border if one country launches counter measures. Both sides had already agreed to open border coordination centers to pass on information about the cross-border movement of the militants.

The MoU was signed a few days after Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif strongly condemned the Afghan Taliban and described the violence as terrorism during his visit to Kabul. Sharif was the first top Pakistani leader to publicly condemn the Afghan Taliban who have stepped up their attacks since their so-called " Spring Offensive" codenamed "Azm" (resolve) in late April.

Pakistan was quick to welcome the NDS-ISI accord at a time when some Afghan political leaders, including former President Hamid Karzai, certain members of parliament and sections of the media raised objections to the accord, citing the years of mistrust.

"The MoU signed with Afghanistan will be helpful in combating terrorism. We are cooperating with Afghanistan in a number of fields and intelligence is one of them," Pakistan Foreign Ministry spokesman Qazi Khailullah said at his weekly briefing on Friday. Pakistani media has also welcomed the agreement and said it will help both terrorism-hit countries to fight terrorism.

The Afghan Presidential Palace and the NDS spokesman have also defended the agreement, but insist that both have signed the MoU and discussions are on going to finalize and formally sign an agreement.

Relations between Pakistan and Afghanistan had been tense during Hamid Karzai's era, however both countries have buried the hatchet after President Ashraf Ghani assumed office in September last year. President Ghani traveled to Pakistan in November and Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, for his part, also visited Kabul earlier this month. Endi