SRINAGAR (India) • Indian soldiers yesterday killed three suspected militants who tried to attack an army base in Indian Kashmir, officers said. The latest incident further raises tensions with Pakistan.

The heavily armed militants attempted to break through the camp's perimeter in Kupwara district before dawn but were repelled by soldiers in exchanges of fire.

"On being challenged, these three terrorists opened indiscriminatory fire on our sentry posts and also onto our living shelters where our jawans (soldiers) were resting," said Colonel Rajiv Saharan, the commanding officer of a counter-insurgency unit at Kupwara.

"Three Pakistani terrorists were eliminated," he added.

A "huge quantity" of guns, grenade launchers and other weapons were seized from the militants and displayed to the media, he said.

The attempted attack was the second in Indian-administered Kashmir this week after militants killed a soldier while trying to raid a base in Baramulla town on Sunday.

Tensions have spiked since New Delhi said last week that it had launched "surgical strikes" on militant posts across the disputed border that divides the Kashmir region between India and Pakistan.

A furious Islamabad denied the strikes, saying two of its soldiers were killed in cross-border firing.

Indian and Pakistani troops regularly exchange fire across their Kashmir border known as the Line of Control, but rarely send ground troops over the line.

AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE