The new chief of the powerful Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) held talks in the United States on Wednesday after a prolonged gap as the countries look to renew their uneasy cooperation in battling extremists. Lieutenant General Zaheer-ul-Islam is the first head of the ISI to visit Washington in a year. He comes just after Pakistan agreed to give NATO convoys access to its border with Afghanistan. Islam held meetings Wednesday at the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) headquarters in Langley, Virginia, a person familiar with his trip said.
Spokespeople for the CIA and Pakistani embassy declined comment. The ISI and the military have long been major power centers inside Pakistan and both were deeply embarrassed when US forces carried out a secret raid in May 2011 that killed Osama bin Laden in the military city of Abbottabad. Islam was appointed in March after the retirement of ISI chief Ahmed Shuja Pasha, who led the agency since September 2008.
