General Pervez Musharraf, president of Pakistan, is speaking to the CNN World Report Conference now. This was his introduction:

"May I first of all commend the CNN for its very independent and unbiased world news coverage, which I believe is best in the world...

I would like to take this opportunity also to say that we, in this part of the world, are trying our best to bring freedom of speech and expression. We have totally liberated the press and the electronic media, and now we have a number of channels operating here with total freedom of speech. With this action I believe we have completed one of the basic principles of democracy..."