Speaking to media persons, he said the massacre incidents had occurred in border villages where homes were spread over a distance. He suggested that the villagers could stay in one complex during the night so that police and Army security could be extended to them.

The proposed expansion plan of the J&K police will also help in curtailing militancy. However, the situation was better but `not exactly peaceful', which could prevail in any state. The improvement has been due to the good co-ordination with the state apparatus.

He said the proxy war in Kashmir had now turned into a mercenary war. As the Kashmiris have rejected the blandishments of the militants, mercenaries from Pakistan, Afghanistan and other countries were indulgingin terrorism. The onslaught of the Taliban against its rivals in Afghanistan was reason for worry as they could spill-over into Kashmir through Pakistan-occupied Kashmir, which borders Afghanistan. He said cleaning up the Siachen glacier of the wastes disposed of by the Army required massive efforts.

Bio-digesters, developed by the Defence Research and Development Organisation, were undergoing trials for treating wastes into environmentally safe materials. The priority is to carry men in the helicopters from the outpost where the temperature remains 30 degrees sub-zero and under near-constant shelling. However, priority will be accorded to keep the glacier unpolluted.