NEW DELHI, May 17: Indian officials on Wednesday rejected calls for an early withdrawal of troops from a Himalayan glacier or from the rest of occupied Kashmir, saying militancy was spreading from the disputed territory to elsewhere in the country.

The comments came ahead of talks next week with Pakistan over the presence of troops on Siachen glacier.

Defence Minister Pranab Mukherjee told parliament “there was no question of any withdrawal of troops from Siachen so long as talks going on with Pakistan on the issue do not yield any results.

“Nine round of talks have been held on Siachen and the 10th round is going to be held on May 23 and 24,” he said.

President Pervez Musharraf earlier this year urged India to withdraw troops from three Kashmiri towns and from Siachen.

Indian military negotiators claim some headway in previous rounds of talks to fix an agreed ceasefire line on Siachen, where extreme weather kills more troops than combat.

“There has been some convergence of views following the exchange of map grid-points but core disputes need to be thrashed out this time,” a senior military surveyor said.

Mr Mukherjee also ruled out troop withdrawals from towns in occupied Kashmir.

“The number of security forces in the valley will depend on the changing threat perception, and since no decrease has been noticed in that regard, no troops withdrawal was under consideration,” he said.

National Security Adviser M. K. Narayanan also rejected calls to withdraw some troops from occupied Kashmir, where insurgency has claimed at least 44,000 lives since 1989.

“Militancy, hitherto confined to that state, is fast spreading to other places, including Varanasi and Bangalore,” Mr Narayanan said in the southern city of Kozhikode.

The comments were a reference to two separate attacks earlier this year in the two cities which were blamed on Islamic militants.

“There are therefore no options for demilitarisation now as we cannot compromise on our security there,” the Press Trust of India quoted him as saying.—AFP