KATHMANDU, March 31 (AFP) - A 13-member joint Sino-Pakistani expedition is to attempt to scale Mount Everest via the Tibetan route in May without using bottled oxygen as far as possible, the expedition leader said Monday.

Addressing a press conference in Kathmandu before setting out for his journey to Tibet on Sunday, Pakistani mountaineer Nazir Sabir, 43, said: "We are going to attempt Everest for international brotherhood by forgetting our religious beliefs and to celebrate the golden jubilee of the Independence of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan."

Sabir and his team members will be accompanied on the first Pakistani attempt up the 8,848-metre (29,028-foot) peak by three ace climbers from Tibet, but they were not named.

"Everest has and will always remain the ultimate manifesto of mountaineers all over the world," said Sabir, who has 25 years of mountaineering experience.

"We forget politics and religion when we start climbing the Himalayan mountains. We forget everything except humanity and the human relationship for international brotherhood."

Sabir has climbed a number of 8,000-metre high Himalayan peaks in the Karakoram area in the Indo-Pakistan frontier since 1974.

"It was my earnest desire to come to the Himalayas as early as in 1979 to make a joint attempt on the Everest along with the Nepalese climbers but due to financial problems, I could not fulfil my dreams at that time," Sabir recalled.

He plans to set up three camps besides the basecamp and make three summit attempts depending on wheather and the conditions of the climbers.

He would not be swayed from his goal, he added.

"I continued to climb the 7,237 metre (23742-foot) high Diran Peak in the Karakorum in 1980 even after the fatal mountain accident which claimed the life of my brother Inayat Ali," Sabir said.

"Almost all the mountaineers know their chance of survival is 50 percent while going to the Himalayas so they are well aware of the risk involved in climbing," he said.

He said the Chinese had offered logistic support for the expedition which was why it was agreed to climb from the Tibetan side.

He plans to spend a week acclimatizing around the northern slope of Everest before setting out for the basecamp without Sherpa mountain guides or porters.

The selection of the final assault members "will largely depend on the physical conditions of the climbers around the elevation of 7,000 metre (22,965 feet)" he said.

The joint expedition is being sponsored by Hub Power Company Limited, and operations director Philip J. Spencer described the joint Sino-Pakistani exepdition as "historic expedition."

"I hope the team under Sabir will be able to scale the peak and make it a crowning achievement in the Pakistani mountaineering history," he said.