Two Indian soldiers were killed and four injured in overnight attacks in the south of Indian-administered Kashmir.
An army spokesman said Muslim rebels, armed with assault rifles and grenades, launched an attack on an Indian army vehicle headed for a search operation in Rajouri district in the south, killing a soldier on the spot and injuring four others.
The area of the attack at Thanamandi was immediately cordoned off and searches launched for the assailants.
Another soldier was killed in a gunbattle with Muslim militants in the village of Gursai in the neighbouring Poonch district last night, the spokesman said.
More than 38,000 people have died in Kashmir since the eruption of anti-Indian rebellion in the region in 1989. Separatists put the toll twice as high.
Violence has continued unabated despite appeals by Indian Kashmir's leader Mufti Mohammed Sayeed for the rebels to lay down their arms to promote a thaw in tension between India and Pakistan.
AFP