Officers said the two UN Land Cruisers, carrying a Belgian and an Italian officer, were out of range of the Indian Army bunker, as it was a good 3 km away. They were reacting to Pakistan media reports that the Indian Army had opened ``small-arms fire'' on the vehicles.

`` `Small arms', which implies at the maximum a Light Machine Gun (LMG), cannot hit at distances of 3 km. Charted on the map, the vehicles were South-West of the LoC and a good 600 m away from it. The bunker was about 2.6 km away from the LoC and North-East of it.

``Media reports have said the tyre of a vehicle burst while another bullet when through the vehicle when they were travelling through the Neelam Valley in POK while investigatinga complaint lodged by the Pakistani Army on violation of the cease-fire by the Indian Army,'' a senior officer here told The Indian Express

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The Indian Army suspects that the firing was staged either by Pakistanis or infiltrators who crossed the LoC onto the Keran sector in India and went back after triggering off shots at the Land Cruisers which are conspicuously marked with UN insignias.

Officials here see the incident as yet another Pakistani attempt to project Kashmir as a flashpoint, especially when the prime ministers of the two countries hold talks. ``It is a desperate plan by Pakistan to secure UN intervention after Prime Minister A B Vajpayee had assured UN Secretary General Kofi Annan on Friday last that reports of high tension on the LoC were grossly exaggerated and alarmist. Pakistan wants to say that India does not even spare UN vehicles,'' said a senior Army officer.

The UNMOG has been asked by the UN headquarters (HQs) at New York to enquire into the firing incident. Deputy ChiefMilitary Observor of the UNMOG, Colonel Flemming Gohansen, said he ``could not say at the moment who had fired upon the UNMOG vehicles,'' adding, ``the two officers are working on their reports on the incident.''

Denying media reports that one of the officers had suffered a bullet injury, Col Gohansen confirmed small arms had been used, and not artillery guns, in the firing.

Col K S Yadav of the 15 Corps headquarters here asserted that Indian Army troops ``had not opened fire on Sunday in that sector. It was all quiet.''

In the last two years, this is the third incident of firing on the UNMOG. In March 1997, UNMOG vehicles were fired at from a distance of 2.5 km in the R S Pora sector on the Pakistani side, while in the previous year, firing on UN vehicles was reported from the Neelam Valley in Pakistan Occupied Kashmir.

``Interestingly, in all three incidents, only the vehicles were hit. No harm came to the UN observers,'' points out an Indian Army officer.

No complaint or protest has been lodgedby the UNMOG with the 15 Corps HQs yet, regarding Sunday's incident, said Col Yadav.

Pakistani media reports said the UNMOG had taken the matter up with the Indian authorities. However, Col Gohansen refused to comment on whether or not the UNMOG had lodged a formal complaint with the Indian Army.

According to an Army officer of the 28 Infantry Division, the UN vehicles' movement was being monitored from Saturday itself, when they had started moving towards the Neelam Valley from the Kanzalwan sector of Gurrez.

On Sunday, the UN team had halted for three hours in the Neelam Valley, and a tyre of a vehicle was changed. The UN team then proceeded South, towards the POK areas which overlook the Tangdhar sector in India.

With India contending that Kashmir is a bilateral issue under the Shimla Agreement, the UNMOG is not allowed to inspect the LoC on the Indian side; neither does the Indian Army lodge complaints with UNMOG of Pakistani cease-fire violations on the LoC. "Since India has been asking theUNMOG to wind up, Pakistan probably sought to portray the firing as an Indian attempt to create a fear psychosis among the UNMOG observers,'' said an Army officer.