PRESIDENT George W Bush yesterday warned General Pervez Musharraf, Pakistan’s military leader, that he must improve his intelligence-gathering to defeat Al-Qaeda and the Taliban in the war on terror. His comments were made amid concern that Islamabad’s grip on the militants within Pakistan’s borders may be loosening.

On the last leg of his Asian tour, the American president reiterated his support for Musharraf, who seized power in a military coup in 1999, but urged him to embrace democracy in the campaign against terrorism.

“The best way to defeat Al-Qaeda is to share good intelligence, to locate them and then be prepared to bring them to justice,” Bush said.

Despite the evident strains in the Washington-Islamabad relationship, Bush told Musharraf that the two countries had developed “a broad and lasting” strategic partnership.

“There’s a lot of work to be done in defeating Al-Qaeda,” the president said.

The contentious issue of sharing intelligence was highlighted in January, when an American missile aimed at Ayman al-Zawahri, Al-Qaeda’s deputy leader, killed at least three foreign militants and a number of civilians in a Pakistani border village. Pakistan claimed it had received no notice of the attack, which prompted countrywide riots.

Many Pakistanis continue to oppose Musharraf’s alliance with the Bush administration and yesterday’s visit provoked days of demonstrations.

Police detained hundreds of activists and Islamabad resembled a ghost town under the security clampdown. Bush barely moved outside the vicinity of the presidency building and nearby US embassy, where he batted in an impromptu cricket match with a local boys’ college.

A rather better-known cricketer, Imran Khan, the former Pakistan captain turned politician, was among the opposition activists gagged during the visit. Prevented from leaving his home, Khan described Musharraf as a “toady and a lackey” of US foreign policy.

At the heart of Musharraf’s problems are his difficulties in bringing any sort of control to Pashtun-controlled Waziristan and the rebellious tribal areas bordering Afghanistan.

Osama Bin Laden is thought to be hiding in the border area and Bush said Pakistan needed the “equipment necessary to move quickly without tipping off the enemy”. He said Musharraf was training special forces for the purpose. “It’s important to stay on the hunt,” he said.

A suicide bomber killed an American diplomat and three other people near the US consulate in the southern city of Karachi on the eve of the talks.

Bush’s comments highlighted growing concern in the West about Pakistan’s relations with its Afghan and Indian neighbours. Musharraf himself conceded there has been some “slippage” with both.

Before Bush’s visit, Musharraf claimed several senior Al-Qaeda figures, including a Chechen militant, were among 45 killed in a raid by Pakistan army helicopter gunships on Waziristan. But the move backfired when tribal Taliban militants drove into Miranshah, the provincial capital, in armoured trucks and took control.

Yesterday Pakistani troops backed by helicopter gunships retaliated, trading fire with about 500 armed tribesmen. At least 46 militants and three Pakistani soldiers were killed.

It is in Waziristan that American and British officials believe key battles in the war on terror are being lost, often because of poor relations between Afghan and Pakistan intelligence officials. Bush is believed to have told Musharraf more “strategic depth” was needed in its relations with Afghanistan.

Diplomats said this meant regular meetings between senior and middle-ranking intelligence staff, military officers and government officials.

Last week Musharraf and Hamid Karzai, his Afghan counterpart, traded public accusations over which country was harbouring foreign militants.

Musharraf suggested the two countries could fence the entire border and lay landmines on either side to counter the threat. But critics said the Pakistan army was in effect confined to fortified barracks in the area because of the fierce tribal menace.

Indeed, Musharraf appears to have all but ceded control in some areas to a Taliban enemy whose forces have inflicted heavy casualties on his troops over the past two years.

An opinion poll conducted in Punjab found that only 3% of 4,000 respondents regarded the US as a trusted partner for Pakistan, while 60% said they did not support the war on the Taliban and Al-Qaeda.

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