Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf pledged to hold free elections as he today began a four-country European trip aimed at winning international support.

Musharraf's popularity has slumped over recent months in Pakistan, which has been racked by militant attacks and faces a parliamentary election on Feb. 18 that is meant to complete a transition to civilian rule.

"We are determined to hold free, fair and transparent elections, and peaceful elections ... There is no possibility of it being rigged," he told reporters at an event in Brussels, where he will meet European Union and NATO officials.

Asked how he would handle any victory at the polls by political opponents, he replied:

"Whoever wins, obviously power will be handed over ... There is no question at all that we will deny forming a government to which ever party forms a majority," he said.

Fears for nuclear-armed Pakistan's stability were heightened by the assassination of opposition leader Benazir Bhutto in a bomb and gun attack on Dec. 27.

A surge of attacks by al Qaeda-linked militants based on the Afghan border has raised concern about prospects for the country and its efforts to support NATO and U.S. forces struggling to subdue Taliban insurgents in Afghanistan.

Musharraf will meet Belgian Prime Minister Guy Verhofstadt, EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana and NATO Secretary-General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer in Brussels.

He will go on to Paris to meet French President Nicolas Sarkozy and then attend the World Economic Forum in Switzerland before talks in London with Prime Minister Gordon Brown.

While Musharraf may get the backing he seeks from European leaders, the former army chief who seized power in a 1999 coup can also expect them to tell him that he must do more to promote democracy and curb the activity of militants.

Speaking to members of Belgium's Pakistani community after arriving late on Sunday, Musharraf said the goal of his trip was "correcting perspectives" in Europe and lauded what he said were improvements in the economy and security under his rule.

Ahead of the trip, former foreign secretary Tanvir Ahmed Khan said he expected Musharraf to seek to impress on Europeans that he was Pakistan's best hope of stability.

"He's trying to establish his credentials with the key Western powers with the same old message: that he's indispensable, they don't have a better friend than him, without him the war on terror would unravel and Pakistan's economic progress would collapse," Khan said.

On Sunday, Pakistan villagers said army helicopter gunships launched strikes in the remote South Waziristan tribal region regarded as a stronghold of a Taliban commander linked with the assassination of Bhutto.