LONDON, Jan 28: Prime Minister Gordon Brown indicated on Monday that Britain’s enhanced assistance to Pakistan or for that matter that of the world would crucially depend on the forthcoming February 18 elections being held in a free, fair and transparent manner and a visible progress on the democratic front.

The British prime minister who was answering questions at a joint press conference here along with President Pervez Musharraf at the 10 Downing Street said an internationally agreed conclusion of the ongoing WTO (Doha) talks would hopefully be helpful in enhancing trade of the developing countries like Pakistan with the developed world.

He was asked if Britain would enhance its economic assistance to Pakistan and also provide Pakistan with enhanced access to its market in view of the worldwide recognition that the root cause of growing extremism in Pakistan and other poor Muslim countries was their poverty.

In his opening remarks, President Pervez Musharraf said he had fruitful talks with the British prime minister and he was thankful for Britain’s enhanced economic cooperation with Pakistan and its enhanced assistance in the social sectors.

He said he had also briefed Mr Brown on the progress so far made on the terror war front which he termed as a ‘challenge’ and added: “We are taking all steps to cope with the challenge.”

Thirdly, he said he had also informed Mr Brown about the steps being taken with regard to democratic transition and his own strong desire to hold free, fair and transparent elections on February 18.

The president said he had also apprised the British Prime Minister about the scenario he believed would unfold beyond the Feb 18 election and how the peaceful transition would take place followed by the setting up of a strong democratic government.

Answering a question, the president disagreed with a suggestion that Pakistan had so far failed to defeat Taliban and Al Qaeda and that it had done very little to reform the Madressahs and control radicalisation in the country.

He said Al Qaeda which was mostly foreign manned was now on the run and Taliban which was a local phenomenon had been controlled to the extent of 42 per cent and the link between the Afghan Taliban and Pakistani Taliban had been severed by enhancing border patrol, putting up fences on selected sites and imposing curfew within 3 kilometres of the border.

He said the Taliban menace cannot be controlled in a matter of five days. “It is going to take a long time and we have a long fight on our hands but so far we are winning the war.”On Madressahs, he said they numbered only 2 per cent of the total schools and that they were being reformed. “About 75 per cent of them have been registered and syllabus of government boards has been introduced in these schools, but they have not yet agreed to conduct examination held by the government boards, but we will keep pursuing the matter.”

While answering a question on British government’s policy to support India’s candidature for a UN Security Council seat, the British prime minister said that his country’s longstanding policy was to support the idea of expansion of the SC. “It is not a country-specific policy but our longstanding policy.”

Discussing a question on Kashmir, Mr Brown said he was happy to see the progress being made on the front and the reduction in militancy there.

Earlier, the two leaders had 90-minute working lunch.

When the president arrived at the 10 Downing, he was greeted by 1,000 to 1,500 flag waving and slogan chanting protesters who were shouting “Go Musharraf Go.”

The crowd was waving flags of the PPP, PML-N and Tehrik-i-Insaaf and was being led by Asma Jehangir of the HRCP, PPP’s local leaders and a delegation of the PPP sent from Pakistan by PPP co-chairperson Asif Ali Zardari to organise protests. The delegation included Chaudhry Abdul Majid, Chaudhry Yaseen and Chaudhry Latif.

Ghous Ali Shah of PML-N, Imran Khan of PTI, his former wife Jemima Khan and Lord Nazir Ahmed were also there with strong presence of their supporters.

Some 50 workers of PML-Q were also waving pictures of President Musharraf and shouting slogans of ‘We support Musharraf’.