India's top security advisory group Wednesday urged the government to pull back some troops from the border with Pakistan, local television reported, in what would be the biggest move to ease tension in almost a year. Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee chaired a National Security Advisory Board meeting that recommended a phased withdrawal of some of the hundreds of thousands of soldiers deployed along the international border, the Aaj Tak and Star television channels reported. They gave no further details.

The cabinet's security committee was due to meet from 6:00 p.m. (1230 GMT) to consider the proposal.

Nuclear-armed India and Pakistan have massed a million men along their border since December in the latest confrontation over disputed Kashmir , the trigger of two of their three wars.

The two sides came close to a fourth war in June, but pulled back after frantic diplomatic lobbying by the United States and other foreign governments.

The government is not obliged to follow the recommendation of the board, which has not met since the 1999 Kargil crisis when India fought for weeks to repel armed intruders who entered Indian Kashmir from Pakistan.

But most of the cabinet's security committee members, including Vajpayee, Deputy Prime Minister Lal Krishna Advani and armed forces chiefs, attended the two-and-a-half hour meeting.

KASHMIR ELECTIONS

The proposal follows a state election in Indian Kashmir that swept a hard-line ally of the national government from power and that analysts say opens the door for moves to bring peace to the Himalayan region after 13 years of anti-Indian revolt.

The latest standoff between South Asia's military giants was triggered by a December raid on India's parliament that New Delhi blamed on Pakistan-based separatist rebels fighting its rule in Muslim-majority Kashmir.

Pakistan has repeatedly called for an end to the deployment.

"India cannot keep troops indefinitely on the border. The time appears appropriate for some reduction," said Uday Bhaskar, an analyst at India's Institute of Defense Studies and Analysis.

Bhaskar also said the approach of winter that will ice up Himalayan passes and make militant infiltration tougher "allows for the rearrangement of (Indian) military forces."

India hopes a new government in Jammu and Kashmir will erode support for the separatist revolt by engaging many Kashmiris who had previously been marginalised.

FOREIGN PRESSURE

Vajpayee also recently returned from Europe, where political leaders pushed him to withdraw soldiers from the border and resume dialogue with Pakistan.

But whatever the extent of any phased pullout, it will not lead to a total withdrawal from either the border or a cease-fire line separating the two sides in Kashmir, both of which are heavily guarded even in normal times.

India could start with a limited withdrawal of key strike units. It could also move to ease tension by returning its diplomatic presence in Islamabad to normal and allowing Pakistan's ambassador to return.

This week, Advani ruled out talks with Islamabad, which he said continued to support "cross-border terrorism" in Kashmir.
Pakistan denies giving military backing to rebels, but says it gives moral support to the Kashmiri "freedom struggle."

Advani said recent elections in Pakistan had strengthened the hands of the army and extremist groups there, "so our worries about cross-border terrorism have deepened." (Additional reporting by Unni Krishnan in NEW DELHI)

PHOTO CAPTION

Indian Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee (R) talks with his deputy Lal Krishna Advani at the start of a National Security Advisory Board meeting in New Delhi October 16, 2002. Vajpayee held the meeting to decide on Wednesday whether to pull back some troops from the border with Pakistan, a move that could signal the first big easing of tensions between the nuclear-armed neighbors in almost a year. (Kamal Kishore/Reuters)