Information Minister Mohammad Ali Durrani said the country's federal and provincial assemblies would see out their full five-year term, which is due to end in November, and that elections would then be held.

"The elections will be held on schedule and there is no possibility of any snap polls," Durrani told AFP. "The assemblies will complete their tenure."

The minister's statement indicates that military ruler Musharraf, who seized power in a bloodless coup in 1999, is set continue with his original plan to seek reelection as president-in-uniform by the current assemblies.

Officials have said this is likely to happen in September.

Such an election would be a way for Musharraf to get around a constitutional provision that says he should quit as chief of the powerful army by the end of 2007.

But Musharraf has faced growing protests against his rule since suspending Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry in March. Political clashes in the southern city of Karachi in May left more than 40 people dead.

Speculation mounted among parliamentarians in recent days that the embattled president would announce snap elections, possibly in mid-July, so he could be reelected by the new assemblies and preempt future political turmoil.

Opposition parties including the Pakistan People's Party of former prime minister Benazir Bhutto say this would be unfair, especially as they allege that tens of millions of voters are missing from electoral rolls.

In the latest protests against Musharraf, around 1,200 lawyers and opposition party activists burned effigies of the president in the eastern city of Lahore on Thursday, while 800 people rallied in northwestern Peshawar.

Meanwhile, a lawyer for Pakistan's government said yesterday it now had no objections if the Supreme Court deals with misconduct charges levelled by President Pervez Musharraf against the country's top judge.

The government previously wanted the allegations against Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry -- who was suspended by military ruler Musharraf in March -- to be dealt with by a special panel of five judges.