President Asif Ali Zardari has stopped interior minister Rehman Malik from making public a report on the investigation into the assassination of former premier Benazir Bhutto, according to a media report Saturday.

"Zardari barred Malik from presenting the report at a meeting of the central executive committee of the ruling PPP that was held on Benazir's fifth death anniversary on Thursday.

"The move came in the wake of an increase in differences between Zardari and Malik," the Daily Express quoted its sources as saying.

The president issued instructions to Malik not to make the report public just hours before the PPP held a rally outside the Bhutto family mausoleum at Garhi Khuda Baksh on Thursday.

Malik had earlier told the media about his intention to make the report public. He had even suggested that PPP chairman Bilawal Bhutto Zardari should launch his political career by revealing the report.

Bhutto was assassinated by a suicide bomber after addressing an election rally in Rawalpindi on  December 27, 2007.