SRINAGAR, India -- An Indian Army official and five Muslim separatist rebels have been killed in separate gun-battles in India's Jammu and Kashmir state, officials said on Friday.

The violence came as tension eased between India and Pakistan, which have been locked in a border confrontation since an attack on the Indian Parliament in December that New Delhi blamed on Pakistan-based guerrillas.

An Indian Army spokesman said security forces shot dead three separatist guerrillas in an overnight clash in Baramulla district, north of Srinagar, the summer capital of Jammu and Kashmir state, Reuters reported.

"The identity of the militants is being ascertained," the spokesman said.

Earlier on Thursday evening, an army official and two separatist guerrillas were killed in another gun-battle in the neighboring area of Athwatoo, police said. They said two soldiers were wounded in the clash.

India, which has massed its army on the Pakistan border, accuses Islamabad of training and arming Muslim militants and pushing them into Indian Kashmir to fight Indian rule.

Pakistan denies the charge but President Pervez Musharraf has vowed to stop militant incursions across a cease-fire line dividing the disputed Himalayan region.

Indian Defense Minister George Fernandes said on Thursday infiltration had nearly ended but troops would remain on the border as long as needed.

About a dozen rebel groups are battling Indian rule in Jammu and Kashmir, India's only Muslim-majority state where officials say more than 33,000 people have been killed since the rebellion broke out in 1989. Separatists put the toll at about 80,000.