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A man who allegedly helped terror suspect Faisal Shahzad travel to Pakistan's tribal belt to attend bomb-making camps was arrested on Thursday.
The arrested suspect has admitted to being an accomplice of Shahzad, who was arrested at New York's JFK airport for plotting a terror attack on Times Square. He also has links with the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan, according to a report in The Washington Post.
The latest arrest confirms the fears of the US administration that the Pakistani Taliban plotted the failed bomb plot in Times Square.
Pakistan has reportedly granted access to the arrested Pakistani man to US investigators, who are trying to match the information disclosed by him to the details revealed by Shahzad.
The investigators are also focusing on phone records, e-mails and other communication of the two men to ascertain their links with the Pakistani Taliban, said the Post. But US authorities refused to identify the suspect, who is reportedly a facilitator for the TTP.
Most details of the account of the terror plot given by Shahzad matches with that of the Pakistani suspect, but there are some inconsistencies in chronology etc, officials told The Washington Post.
If the arrest of the Pakistani suspect conclusively proves that the TTP was behind the Times Square plot, it will force the US to intensify pressure on Islamabad to launch another operation in its restive tribal area, say experts.
But a senior US administration official admitted that they had not yet found any concrete evidence to link Shahzad with the Pakistani Taliban.