Pak PM warns against arms race in Asia

"As a nuclear weapons state, we adhere to the doctrine of minimum credible deterrence and are opposed to any nuclear proliferation as well as an arms race in the region," he told a Washington forum on Monday.

Aziz, here for talks with US President George W. Bush and other senior administration officials, said Pakistan had proposed a "strategic restraint regime" to prevent an arms race and ensure that stability was maintained in the region.

He noted that arch rival India's nuclear tests in 1998 forced Pakistan "to respond in order to establish a credible nuclear deterrence.

"Failure to do so could have created a dangerous ambiguity about our capacity and could have led to possible miscalculations," he said, stressing that Pakistan wanted to be an "anchor of peace and stability in the region."

Aziz did not speak of any new threats posed by India or other neighbours but emphasized without elaborating that any induction of anti-ballistic missile systems would have a destabilising impact on the entire region.

The region is bristling with missiles.

India, flush with success of its medium-range ballistic missile, is reportedly developing an intercontinental ballistic missile.

Pakistan has developed and tested a number of missiles while China, far ahead of others in the missile race in the region, has an arsenal of short and long-range missiles.

On Iran, Aziz said relations with the fellow Islamic nation were "guided by compulsion of geography and history.