NEW YORK, Sept 23 Former Pakistan president Gen (retd) Pervez Musharraf told a gathering at Brown University in Providence (Rhode Island) on Tuesday that terrorists were the greatest threat to stability in South Asian, adding that Pakistan and neighbouring India and Afghanistan represented a “nexus of extremism”.

According to a report on Brown University's website, Gen (retd) Musharraf rejected a perception that Pakistan supplied arms to Muslim fundamentalists in Afghanistan.

“It's quite the opposite. The arms and money flow into Pakistan from Afghanistan, not the other way,” he said.

The retired general pointed to the Students Islamic Movement of India as an example of extremism growing among the Muslim youth in India. “There is a sense of frustration ... of unequal opportunity and discrimination in India,” he said.

In a 45-minute speech about “leadership experiences”, he blamed the current economic crisis in Pakistan on the country's current leaders.

“It's not a crisis of nation or people, but a crisis of leadership. Simple as that,” Gen (retd) Musharraf said of the massive exodus of wealth and foreign investment from the country in the past year.

However, he did not address the turmoil that ultimately ended his nine-year reign, including his 2007 firing of the Supreme Court chief justice, his subsequent suspension of the constitution and the assassination of opposition leader Benazir Bhutto.

“I would have liked to have seen someone ask about what policies of governance he would have changed in retrospect,” Arsalan Ali Faheem, president of the university's Pakistani Students Association, was quoted by the website as saying.

In a brief question-and-answer session, Mr Musharraf defended Pakistan's development of nuclear arms as a logical response to India's development of nuclear weapons, but called for peace between the two longstanding rivals.

“I am called a man of war, but I am a man of peace because I understand the ravages of war,” he said. “Military (action) only buys time, it does not deliver the cure.”

Since his resignation, Musharraf has been on an extended international speaking tour, using London as his base.

On Tuesday, there was heightened security on the Brown University campus.

The main auditorium at Salomon Hall was filled to capacity with about 600 seated, and a nearby overflow room, where the speech was televised, had about 200 additional guests.