Rice flies to India to ease tension with Pakistan

By C. Bryson Hull

NEW DELHI (Reuters) - Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice was due in New Delhi on Wednesday as part of intense U.S. efforts to ease tension between India and Pakistan that has surged over the Mumbai attacks.

The top U.S. military commander was also visiting the nuclear-armed South Asian rivals and India's senior-most diplomat held meetings in Washington in other initiatives.

The 10 Islamist gunmen who killed 183 people in a three-day rampage in India's financial capital last week were from a Pakistani militant group, investigators said.

India has long said Pakistan is unable or unwilling to act against groups on its soil that launch such strikes and the attacks threatened to unravel improving ties between the adversaries, who have fought three wars since independence from Britain in 1947.

Islamabad has denied involvement and condemned the Mumbai attacks.

India's Foreign Minister Pranab Mukherjee said military action was not being considered but later warned a peace process begun in 2004 was at risk if Pakistan did not act decisively.

"It has vitiated the atmosphere," Mukherjee said of the attacks in an interview to NDTV television. "While we have no intention of not carrying on with the peace process, when people's sentiments are affected it creates an atmosphere not to carry on business as usual, it has some impact."

The deterioration could also put U.S. counterterrorism efforts in the region at risk -- Islamabad has said the tensions may force it to shift troops from operations against al Qaeda militants on the Afghanistan border to the frontier with India.