Pakistan spy chief scraps UK trip on "terror" remarks

By Chris Allbritton and David Milliken

ISLAMABAD/LONDON (Reuters) - Pakistan's spy chief has cancelled a trip to Britain, a spokesman said on Saturday, but Islamabad played down a row over remarks by Prime Minister David Cameron suggesting Pakistan was not doing enough to fight terrorism.

A spokesman for the Inter-Service Intelligence (ISI) agency said on Saturday that senior intelligence officials, including ISI head Lieutenant General Ahmad Shuja Pasha, would not go to London on Monday as planned for counter-terrorism talks.

But President Asif Ali Zardari will still visit Britain next week, a government spokesman said.

Cameron, speaking in Pakistan's rival India on Wednesday, told Islamabad that it must not become a base for militants and "promote the export of terror" across the globe.

A Pakistani foreign ministry spokesman said this week his country had been "saddened" by Cameron's remarks.

Information Minister Qamar Zaman Kaira, already in Britain ahead of Cameron's remarks, said the prime minister's remarks were "contrary to the facts" and "not in good taste."

"But our reasonable reaction is ... we will discuss this matter at the highest level of the leadership and give them the facts," he told a news conference in London.

"If we go back into history, our relations with the UK are very good. And we want to keep up those relations, strengthen those relations," he said.