(AFP) Malaysia pledged co-operation in fighting terrorism today as it came under scrutiny over a report that a suspect in the US attacks had been sighted in the capital Kuala Lumpur.

Deputy Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi said Malaysia would not shelter groups with terrorism on their agenda irrespective of whether they were Malaysians or foreigners, the official Bernama news agency reported.

"We have always categorically stated that we do not condone, in fact we are absolutely against, whatever form of terrorism."

Abdullah was commenting on a US report that one of the hijack suspects in the airliner which hit the Pentagon had been caught on a surveillance tape in Kuala Lumpur meeting a man linked to Islamic militant Osama bin Laden.

The meeting was between suspect Khalid Al-Midhar and an activist believed to have played a part in the attack on the US warship USS Cole in the Yemeni port of Aden in October last year, Newsweek reported.

The suicide attack on the Cole, which killed 17 sailors, was linked by US officials to bin Laden, who has been named as the prime suspect in last week's air assaults on New York and Washington.

The date of the Kuala Lumpur meeting between the two men was unclear.

"If the US has information on the matter, we hope it could be conveyed to us so that we could provide assistance," Abdullah said.

KMM monitored

Abdullah said Malaysia would not be influenced by a call for a holy war if the US attacked Afghanistan for sheltering bin Laden, and would monitor the movements of local extremists in the "Malaysian Mujahideen Group".

"We would like to say here that what the people of Malaysia should do is to act in the interest of the country... we need not heed the call of other parties," he said.

The army's Region Two commander for the states of Sabah and Sarawak on Borneo island, Major-General Mohd Azumi Mohammed, said Malaysia and the Philippines were co-operating to check movements of extremist groups.

Reports have suggested that Bin Laden's network -- al-Qaeda, or The Base - has links with extremists in the Philippines, Indonesia and Malaysia.

Two days after the attacks, the Philippines refused entry to nine Malaysian passport-holders who had spent five months in Pakistan, fearing they could have undergone terrorist training.

Armed forces chief General Mohd Zahidi Zainuddin said Malaysia's military was ready to counter any threat to national sovereignty if war erupted in the wake of the terror attacks in the US.

ISA justified

Asked by reporters whether Islamic Malaysia could become a target, the general said he was confident this would not arise as the United States had offered assurances that it linked the enemy to terrorism, not religion.

"We have offered our assistance to help fight the terrorists and the US Joint Chief of Staff gave his assurance that the war was against terrorists and not the Muslims," he said.

The Malaysian government has also pointed to the attacks on the US as justification for its widely-condemned use of detention without trial under the Internal Security Act (ISA).

"ISA's role is crucial. When dealing with terrorism it is invoked as an initial preventive measure before threats get beyond control," said Abdullah.

Ten alleged members of the "Malaysian Mujahideen Group", blamed for a spate of crimes including the bombing of a church and an Indian temple, were detained under the ISA in August.

Among the detainees are seven members of the opposition Parti Islam SeMalaysia (PAS), which wants to create a rigid Islamic state in Malaysia.