NEW YORK, Oct 1: President Pervez Musharraf said in an interview on Sunday that some retired Inter-Services Intelligence officials could be assisting Taliban insurgents, adding: “We are keeping a very tight watch and we will get hold of them if that at all happened”.

“I have some reports that some dissidents, some retired people who were in the forefront in ISI during the period of 1979 to 1989 may be assisting the links somewhere here and there,” Gen Musharraf said in an interview with NBC Television’s “Meet the Press” which was recorded before he left the United States.

But he rejected allegations that the ISI was at present acting in collusion with the Taliban. “I totally disagree with this. Nobody in the ISI helps” the militia, he asserted.

Asked about the Iraq war, Gen Musharraf said that the US should not leave Iraq now, despite having stated earlier that the Iraq war was a mistake and that it had made the world less safe.

“No, they can’t. They should not because again it will destabilise the situation and I agree with President Bush in what he is doing,” said Gen Musharraf.

“Whatever has happened now has happened. Now we have to make sure that we stabilise and then come out. Otherwise it has its reverberations that will be felt in the Gulf.”

“Instead of talking about what it has become, we are talking about what is the present and what is the solution to the problem. That is more important to me... and whatever has happened has happened,” the president added.

About Osama bin Laden, Gen Musharraf said extremists would become more active if Al Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden was captured inside Pakistan, but insisted his government would not be toppled because of it.

“No, no, never. That will never happen and I am not fearful,” he said when asked if he was concerned about implications to his government if Osama was caught inside Pakistan. “But yes indeed it will cause... waves within the extremists. The extremists will get more active. These are my apprehensions and I am not fearful. Not at all.”

“My government does not get toppled. People support me. People know what I am doing and it is not that fragile.”

He rejected as “misperception” that there would be re-deployment or withdrawal of troops after a deal signed by the Pakistan government with tribal chiefs of Waziristan.

“There are two misperceptions. When you say you have withdrawn the military, the unfortunate part is this is being spread by people with vested interest. Not one soldier has been moved out...not one soldier has been relocated. The military is there and we think what we are doing will be to success.

“We are only involved in military operation. And military operations are not solutions in themselves. They will only buy you time and create an environment which my army did on our side.

“And having that environment, these tribals themselves approached the governor saying we want to reach a peace agreement and we put a bottom-line for it... which is not negotiable: No Al Qaeda activity, no Taliban activity on our side or across the border. This is a strategy which has a ray of hope, a ray of success,” he said.

“We should emulate this on the Afghan side instead of criticising it and not coming up with a counter-strategy,” he added.

Gen Musharraf was again critical of Afghan President Hamid Karzai saying: “I wouldn’t follow his example of not knowing anything and yet talking...who is informing him I would like to know. I would like him to substantiate whatever he is saying. I don’t know it. How can I say that he (bin Laden) is in this side or that side (of the border)?”

“He could possibly, and I can only guess, be in the border area,” Musharraf said.