Musharraf acts to ease tension with India

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan -- President Pervez Musharraf is close to unveiling a "bold and principled" initiative aimed at easing the threat of war with India, U.S. senators said Tuesday.\nSpeaking after meeting the Pakistani leader, the visiting nine-member delegation also said the United States was prepared for a long-term commitment to the region as part of its global anti-terror campaign.\nThe United States and its allies have been trying to get the two neighbors to step back from their latest confrontation, which began Dec. 13 with a suicide attack on India\'s Parliament by suspected Muslim militants.\nIndia says the guerrillas -- along with others who attacked its Kashmir state legislature Oct. 1 -- were backed by Pakistan. Musharraf denies that. Both the nuclear-armed neighbors have sent tens of thousands of troops to their shared frontier in disputed Kashmir.\nIn Kashmir, hostilities persisted Tuesday. Indian authorities said three suspected Islamic militants attacked an army camp in Indian-ruled Kashmir with guns and grenades, killing one soldier. They said two attackers were slain.\nSen. Joseph Lieberman urged President Bush to "seize the moment of both crisis and opportunity" by sending an envoy to negotiate an end to the dispute.\nHe praised Pakistan' support of America's anti-terrorism campaign in Afghanistan and said Musharraf wants to recreate his country as a "nation with a majority Muslim population that will be tolerant and moderate and modern" -- an example to the rest of the Muslim world.\nMuslim Pakistan and Hindu-majority India have twice gone to war over Kashmir, the mostly Muslim region divided between them after the subcontinent gained independence from Britain in 1947.