Pakistan had "stage-managed" the unprecedented snub to two top Obama administration officials by the ISI as the means of telegraphing its resentment over a number of issues brewing between Washington and Islamabad, a report said on Wednesday.

By this, establishment in Islamabad is trying to limit one-to-one contact between Washington and the various key Pakistani institutions especially the ISI, the US think tank Stratfor said.

Such display, the Stratfor said, will complicate the Obama administrations strategy on the Taliban.

The observations by the influential American think-tank come in the wake of reports that ISI chief Lt Gen Ahmed Shuja Pasha had refused to meet US Special envoy Richard Holbrooke and Chairman Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Mike Mullen on Tuesday.

An ISI spokesman in Islamabad had denied such a report. Stratfor, however, said it had learned that the top US military commander and Washington's pointman on Afghanistan and Pakistan had requested a separate meeting with ISI chief, which was not granted.

The think tank said that the Pakistan establishment is trying to limit contact between US officials and Pakistani institutions especially the ISI, which in this case meant having a group meeting with Army and intelligence chiefs instead of separate meetings.

Holbrooke and Mullen were in Islamabad on Tuesday during which they met President Asif Ali Zardari, Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani, Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi, opposition leader Nawaz Sharif and Army chief Gen Ashfaq Pervez Kayani.

Pakistan Military spokesman Maj Gen Athar Abbas said Pasha was present in the meeting between US officials and Kayani.

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