'We're ready for nuclear war'

Tension between India and Pakistan rose today as thousands of rival troops massed on the border and Delhi's military chief said his country was ready to fight either a conventional or nuclear war.

General S Padmanabhand said a "warlike" situation was developing on the border. He added: "The situation can comfortably be described as serious." At a hawkish news conference the general said the Indian army was fully prepared for any conventional war with Pakistan and was ready to mount a counter-nuclear strike should Islamabad use nuclear weapons first.

He said any nuclear exchange would be "disastrous" for the whole region but added that any country using nuclear weapons against India would be "punished so severely" their survival would be in doubt.

India has always said it has a large enough nuclear stockpile to sustain a nuclear war with Pakistan and can absorb a first strike before destroying its neighbour.

Today General Padmanabhand also said the country has the ability to strike at "rebel" camps within Pakistan which India claims are being used to mount cross-border terrorist raids and said Islamabad needed to "do more" to rein in terrorists groups operating there.

Despite a clampdown on Islamic militant groups and arrests of 300 members in Pakistan, India says that the camps still exist in Pakistan's part of Kashmir and the militants continue to cross the ceasefire line dividing the Himalayan territory to explode bombs and grenades and carry out gun assaults on Indian soldiers, police and civilians.

There have also been widespread demands in India for military action against the camps since a suicide bombing at the Jammu-Kashmir state assembly building in October which killed 40 people and last month's attack on the parliament building in Delhi.

Both armies traded fire in the disputed Himalayan area of Kashmir today as Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf worked on a speech the world hopes will cool tensions. It is expected to detail fresh curbs on anti-Indian militants.

But with India sceptical of how far General Musharraf can go in the face of public opinion, India is pressing its case in Washington and preparing further sanctions.

It has already cut back diplomatic relations and severed transport links with Pakistan and sources hint that Pakistan's high commissioner could be sent home.

Pakistani officials have been playing down prospects of a history-making move by General Musharraf on the Kashmir dispute, which has sparked two of the three wars between the neighbours since their birth in 1947.

General Musharraf has denounced terrorism and vowed a clampdown on extremist groups within his borders fighting Indian rule in Kashmir but India has demanded more concrete action, including Pakistan's surrender of 20 alleged terrorists.

Amid the tense stand-off and the biggest military build-up in 15 years, India plans to go ahead with two annual large-scale wargames along the Pakistani border.

India has more than 1.1million active troops. Defence officials will not say how many have been moved to the border but experts believe most have been deployed.

The two countries conducted tit-for-tat nuclear tests in 1998 and have since been working on developing missiles capable of delivering nuclear warheads.