The renewed violence comes before weekend talks in New Delhi between the foreign ministers of the two nations in a new push to end their decades-old Kashmir dispute.

Police said three of the rebels were shot in the Trikunda sector of southern Rajouri district after crossing into Indian Kashmir, and a fourth in northern Kupwara district. Both areas border Pakistan-administered Kashmir and are favoured infiltration routes.

"The militants were killed once they entered our side after crossing the Line of Control," a police spokesman said.

Infiltration is at the core of the confrontation, with New Delhi accusing Islamabad of easing the cross-border movement of rebels. Pakistan says it gives only moral support to Kashmiri rebels.

Suspected rebels overnight shot dead Nazir Malik, a senior functionary of the state's ruling Peoples Democratic Party in central Budgam district, police said.

Also overnight, rebels shot dead a former colleague now working for Indian troops in the southern town of Anantnag, police said.

An 18-year-old Muslim boy was killed and his mother and sister injured by rebel gunfire in Rajouri district early Thursday, police said, without giving details.

Six paramilitary soldiers and three civilians were injured overnight when suspected Islamic rebels hurled a grenade at a patrol guarding Srinagar's Mughal-built Nishat garden on the east of Srinagar's picturesque Dal Lake.

The garden was built by Emperor Jehangir in the 16th Century and is one of the main tourist attractions in Srinagar, the state's summer capital.

The 15-year-old insurgency against Indian rule has left at least 40,000 people dead.

India and Pakistan both claim the scenic Himalayan state and since independence from Britain in 1947 have fought two of their three wars over Kashmir.

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