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India, Pakistan behaving responsibly: Rumsfeld

United States Secretary of Defence Donald Rumsfeld, winding up a mission to ease tensions between India and Pakistan, said on Thursday night that he believed the leaders of the two countries were behaving responsibly.

But Rumsfeld, speaking to reporters on his plane home, said it was essential to maintain international efforts to draw the two countries away from war, and there was still a risk they could slide back toward conflict.

He declined to discuss whether Indian or Pakistani leaders had moved any of their nuclear weapons during the build-up of about a million forces on their border in recent months.

"I'm not going to talk about nuclear weapons. I think that the elevation of that subject is past us and both of those leaders are managing their affairs as people responsible for weapons of that power ought to manage them," he said.

He declined to clarify his remarks, made shortly before a refuelling stop in Bahrain as his plane headed from Islamabad to Washington.

He said it was vital to maintain the momentum toward scaling down the conflict, adding the crisis between the two countries could re-ignite.

He said upcoming elections in both countries could increase tensions.

"As you move toward election periods in both countries there will be pressure within parties and between parties to do or say (inflammatory) things," he said.

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