Deepening divisions between Pakistan and Britain were exposed today when President Asif Ali Zardari pulled out of a planned press conference with Gordon Brown.
Downing Street played down talk of a snub, insisting it was happy that the Pakistan prime minister, Yusuf Raza Gilani, took part in the press conference instead.
"It is entirely appropriate that he has a press conference with his counterpart," a No 10 spokesman said. However, on his last visit to Pakistan in December, Brown and Zardari did stage a joint press conference.
Zardari and Brown met for a private meeting after the press conference. But his absence from the press conference comes as the Pakistanis chide British officials for overly hasty conduct after the arrest of 11 Pakistani students a fortnight ago. The Home Office refused to share any information about the arrests with Pakistan.
At the press conference, Brown defended the arrests.
"I think we have got to recognise that we have both got problems that are affecting both the security of our citizens and the sentiments in our country, with terrorist plots that have been planned and some people are trying to execute. We want to work together with Pakistan to deal with these issues and to tackle terrorism at its roots."
Brown flew into Islamabad after a whistlestop visit to Kabul and Helmand province in Afghanistan.
The Pakistani press had predicted that the prime minister would receive short shrift from Pakistani officials after the prime minister's condemnation of 11 Pakistani nationals who were arrested on terror charges in the UK.
At the time, Brown said UK intelligence services had foiled a "very big plot" before all were released without charge. Senior Pakistani defence officials have said the British authorities failed to consult them adequately, and greater cooperation would have avoided "embarrassing mistakes" for the British government.
In the days after the arrest of the Pakistani students, the government maintained its criticism of Pakistan with the immigration minister, Phil Woolas, saying that the allocation of student visas to young Pakistanis – between 2004 and 2008, 42,000 were issued – was the "biggest loophole in British border controls".
A memorandum of understanding had been presented to the Pakistanis under which the UK government was to have the right to deport any Pakistani on the grounds that he or she had become a threat to national security without having to follow due process.
In an interview with the Guardian on Saturday, the Pakistani deputy high commissioner, Asif Durrani, said he regarded constant British briefing that Pakistan was a hot bed of terrorism to be "vindictive" and "slurs".
Today Brown repeated his assertion last made on his December visit four months ago that three-quarters of Islamic terror threats originate in the border region between the UK and Pakistan
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