Pakistan People's Party Co-Chairman Asif Ali Zardari has warned against the rise in Taliban power, and the defeat in global war on terror.

In an interview with the BBC, the widower of slain Benazir Bhutto said that the Pakistani Taliban have "the upper hand" and should be put on the list of banned organizations in Pakistan.

"It is an insurgency", he said, adding, "and an ideological war. It is our country and we will defend it. The world is losing the war. I think at the moment they (the Taliban) definitely have the upper hand”.

Zardari warned that the insurgency would not plague only Pakistan and Afghanistan, but that it would spread further. "The whole world is going to be affected by it."

Zardari has been named by the PPP as the party's presidential nominee.

The country's parliament and four provincial assemblies will elect a president to replace Pervez Musharraf, who quit in the face of the threat of impeachment by his political opponents, on September 6.

Zardari, who took over the leadership of the PPP after Bhutto was assassinated, has proclaimed confidence that he would win.

But Zardari's main coalition partner, Nawaz Sharif of the PML-N, does not favor Zardari for the position and prefers what he calls a 'consensus' president.

HE/BGH