Pakistan has promised a visiting Chinese official that it will crack down on Chinese Muslim separatists who use Pakistani territory as a base for attacks in neighboring China.

Pakistani Interior Minister Rehman Malik made the pledge Tuesday to China's public security minister, Meng Jianzhu. Malik said enemies of China such ethnic Uzbek separatists and the East Turkistan Islamic Movement also are considered enemies of Pakistan. He vowed that Pakistani forces will “strike very hard against them.”

China says ethnic Uighur militants it blames for deadly attacks in its western Xinjiang region in July received training in Pakistani terrorist camps. It is not clear how the Pakistani government will take action against such militant bases within its territory.

The United States repeatedly has called on Islamabad to launch an offensive against bases of the Haqqani militant group in Pakistan's North Waziristan tribal region, but Pakistani authorities have refused. U.S. officials blame Haqqani militants for recent attacks on U.S. targets in Afghanistan and accuse Pakistani intelligence agents of helping them, a charge Islamabad denies.

Pakistan's promise of action against anti-China militants appears to be an effort to win favor with Beijing at a time when the Pakistani military alliance with the United States is under severe strain.

Pakistani Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani also met with Chinese minister Meng on Tuesday. Mr. Gilani said the friendship between the two nations is “higher than mountains, deeper than oceans, stronger than steel and sweeter than honey.”

Chinese state news agency Xinhua says Meng told Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari that the two nations are “good brothers.” It says Meng made the comment late Monday, when both sides signed economic and technical agreements worth $250 million.

Xinjiang has been plagued by ethnic violence between majority Han Chinese and the minority Turkic-speaking Muslim Uighurs. Exile groups say the Uighurs have been economically and culturally repressed in their homeland by a growing influx of Han Chinese.

July's attacks in Xinjiang killed more than 20 people, including 14 assailants who were shot by police. A group calling itself the Turkestan Islamic Party released a video this month claiming responsibility.