"Essentially it was a very casual statement," Fernandes told the newly-launched NDTV news channel, referring to a statement by Foreign Minister Yashwant Sinha that Pakistan was a "fit case" for military action as it had weapons of mass destruction, sheltered terrorists and lacked democracy.

Sinha made the comment in an interview to the Hindustan Times newspaper last week, which was endorsed by Fernandes a few days later.

"It was purely a proposition that came to his mind and he put it across. There was no suggestion to anybody that they should take any action," Fernandes said.

"It was very casual statement not a policy statement or a considered view of a certain section of people," he added.

US Secretary of State Colin Powell on Thursday said there were no parallels between the situations in South Asia and Iraq, while Islamabad dismissed the remarks.

India accuses Pakistan of supporting terrorism by arming and training Muslim militants in Kashmir. Islamabad denies the charge but says it offers moral and political support to what it describes as Kashmiris' legitimate struggle for self-expression.

More than 38,000 people have died in Kashmir, India's only Muslim-majority state, since the launch of the armed insurgency by Islamic guerrillas in 1989 in the Himalayan territory.

SPACE.WIRE