NEW YORK, May 24: The US officials on Friday expressed deep concern over Pakistan’s decision to shift troops from its border with Afghanistan where they were engaged in the hunt for al Qaeda and Taliban fighters, to Kashmir in face of Indian threats.

A report in the New York Times said that if the troops were shifted by Pakistan, the move would constitute a serious blow to Washington’s efforts to wipe out al Qaeda and Taliban diehards in the rugged and lawless border region between Pakistan and Afghanistan.

“We are concerned,” Defence Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said in an interview on CNN.

“We could be getting a lot more help from the Pakistanis if there were not the tense situation with respect to the two countries,” Rumsfeld said. “They have forces along the Indian borders that we could use along the Afghan border. And it’s unfortunate.”

The announcement underscored the competing interests “not only for Pakistan and India, but also for the United States” between ferreting out terrorists’ remnants while securing the region against the possibility of a full-blown war between the nuclear-armed rivals.

The paper said that for the last six days, thousands of people had reportedly filed out of the region as the two armies had shelled each other with mounting intensity across the Line of Control in Kashmir, where India and Pakistan had fought two past wars.

Experts have suggested that India’s leaders may be using bellicose language in an effort to get the United States to press Pakistan to end what they regard as a 20-year campaign of terrorism to drive India from Kashmir.