August 04  
All options open if Australia pull out of tour 

KARACHI: Pakistan would consider playing at a neutral venue if Australia refused to go ahead with a planned test series in the south Asian state because of security concerns. 

After issuing a veiled threat on Friday that it could co-ordinate an Asian boycott of the sport in retaliation for an Australian refusal to tour, the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) said on Saturday it would look at all the options. 

"I was contacted by someone from Australia yesterday and I informed him that it was not a direct threat against the Australian board," PCB Chairman Tauqir Zia said. 

"But I said that if they didn't agree to come to Pakistan, then we would exercise all our options available to us. 
"Right now we remain very optimistic. But if we get a 'no' from the Australians then we will exercise all our options. That includes deciding if it is worthwhile playing at a neutral venue," Zia said. 

Australia has yet to confirm whether it will tour Pakistan as planned in October for a proposed test series. Several leading players have said they are unwilling to travel to Pakistan for fear of bomb attacks like the one which killed 11 French people three Pakistanis in the southern city of Karachi in May. 

The attack prompted New Zealand to cancel their tour. 
Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf contacted Australian Prime Minister John Howard and told him that the safety of the Australia cricket team could be guaranteed. 

But Howard said on Saturday the final decision rested not with the government but with the Australian Cricket Board. 

"(General Musharraf) said he could guarantee the security of the team and expressed the strong desire of the Pakistani government and cricket board that the tour go ahead," Howard told reporters on Queensland's Sunshine Coast. 

"I told (General Musharraf) that the decision about whether or not the tour goes ahead will be taken by the Australian Cricket Board (ACB) not the Australian government," Howard said. 

"I am not going to put any pressure on the Australian Cricket Board to make a decision." Howard said he had passed on the details of his conversation with the Pakistan leader to the ACB. 

PCB Director Chishty Mujahid made a veiled threat of a retaliatory Asian boycott on Friday. He said the personal intervention of Musharraf in the dispute should be enough to convince the Australians that they would be safe in Pakistan. "If they can't accept the President's assurances then it would be very unfortunate," Mujahid said. 

"In those circumstances Pakistan will have to rely on the support it has in the Asian cricket bloc to find a permanent solution to this problem of teams refusing to tour Pakistan on security grounds." 

Pakistan has become increasingly frustrated at teams' reluctance to travel to the country. Its fixture list has been in disarray since the September 11 attacks on the Untied States, and subsequent U.S.-led war in neighbouring Afghanistan. 

The West Indies called off a tour of Pakistan earlier this year which was later played on neutral territory in Sharjah. Pakistan has also been forced to move a triangular one-day series to Kenya due to security concerns. Pakistan says it has lost more than $20 million in revenues because of cancelled or changed tours.