(AKI) - Pakistan's secret services are not aiding the Taliban or seeking to weaken the Afghan government led by president Hamid Karzai: on the contrary, Pakistan "wants a strong and democratic Afghanistan," Pakistani president Pervez Musharraf told Spanish daily El Pais in a wide-ranging interview. Osama bin Laden and [Taliban leader] Mullah Omar are probably hiding in Afghanistan. I doubt they have ever entered Pakistan, but it's impossible to be sure," Musharraf stated. Pakistan is considered by many to be a bastion for Islamist terrorism - a claim Musharraf has steadfastly denied.The Pakistani leader had condemnation for Karzai "and those like him who do nothing to fight terrorism and cricitise Pakistan, which has deployed 80,000 soldiers along the 2,600 kilometre long border with Afghanistan." Pakistan "does not want to govern Afghanistan or turn it into a protectorate," Musharraf underlined.
Turning to the conflict wracked Iraq, Musharraf told El Pais he saw no alternative to negotiation. A move towards this would be a conference attended by Iraq's neighbours Iran and Syria. Another prerequisite for peace in Iraq is the "transfer of security to the Iraqis themselves," and a less visible US troop presence, Musharraf said.
He did not rule out US intervention in Iran if the stand-off over its uranium enrichment programme continues. "Such an event would have an impact on everyone, including Pakistan," Musharraf warned. "While recognising the strategic value of our country's decades-long alliance with the US, most Pakistanis are anti-American and this sentiment would intensify in such a scenario," he said.
Musharraf, who is currently on his first official visit to Spain, was due on Thursday to give a keynote speech on dialogue and cooperation between the Muslim and Western worlds organised by the newly formed Casa Arabe which bring Spain and the Arab/Muslim world closer together. There are believed to be around one million Muslims living in Spain.
Musharaff's visit to Spain is the first leg of a week-long European tour to that will take in Poland, Spain, Bosnia Herzegovina and Turkey.
Amid heightened security, Musharraf on Wednesday visited the southern city of Cordoba's cathedral-mosque but did not pray inside the building. Although Muslims in Spain have asked to be allowed to pray there, Spain's Catholic Church has turned down their request on the grounds that joint use of consecrated places of worship would "generate confusion" and lead to "religious indifference."
The Cordoba mosque - a UNESCO world heritage site - was turned into a Catholic cathedral in the 13th Century after the city was conquered by King Ferdinand III in the war to drive the North African Moors from the Iberian peninsula. Cordoba was the capital of 'al-Andalus' or the area of southern Spain under Arab rule from the eighth to the 15th century AD.