Prince Charles preaches religious tolerance in Pakistan

RAWALPINDI, Pakistan Oct 31 (Reuters) Britain's Prince Charles cancelled a trip to North West Frontier Province today as anti-Western Islamists stoked Pashtun tribal anger over the Pakistan army's attack on a militant-linked school.

Charles had intended to visit a madrasa, or religious school, in the provincial capital of Peshawar and deliver a speech on inter-faith relations, but it was deemed too unsafe for the heir to the throne and his wife Camilla, the Duchess of Cornwall.

They went instead to Fatima Jinnah University in Rawalpindi, the garrison city next door to the capital, before going on to the town of Taxila, an ancient seat of learning that Alexander the Great passed through during his Asian campaigns.

''In a secular age you hear again and again that religion is the cause of so much misery and strife in the world. However, religion itself is not a problem,'' Prince Charles told a hall full of women students sitting cross-legged before him at the university in Rawalpindi.

He spoke out against literal interpretations of religious texts that were creating conflicts both between and within faiths.

''Will you, for instance, have the moral courage to stand up against the kind of mistaken and misguided leadership that can so easily set one community against another?'' Prince Charles asked.

The royal couple chatted with staff and students, most of whom wore colourful shalwar kameez, the Pakistani woman's traditional tunic and baggy trousers.

Britain recently became embroiled in a public debate over the assimilation of Muslims due to controversy over women wearing the niqab -- a headscarf and veil with only a slit for eyes -- but there was hardly one to be seen among the students, and most wore their hair uncovered.

In deference to Pakistani conservatism, Camilla wore a pale blue frock coat and white trousers, with blue dupatta, a long scarf, draped across her shoulders.

Security concerns meant the royal couple's chances of meeting ordinary Pakistanis during their five-day visit were limited even before yesterday's airstrike on a madrasa in the Bajaur tribal region near the border with Afghanistan.

The military said around 80 suspected militants were killed in the attack.

The airstrike sparked protests in towns across the volatile Frontier province, where opposition to President Pervez Musharraf's support for the war on terrorism runs deep.

Opposition Islamist politicians have portrayed the dead as mere students, but the government said the madrasa was being used to train militants, and was run by a pro-Taliban Muslim cleric, wanted for harbouring al Qaeda fighters.

REUTERS AKJ RN1815