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Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf addresses the nation on Monday, the third day of planned missile tests that India has called provocative and which have stoked fears of war between the two neighbours.

A government spokesman said Musharraf, under heavy international pressure to rein in Islamic militants, would speak on state television at 8.30 pm (1430 GMT) about the "current border situation" with India.

Both countries have massed close to a million men along their frontier since a December attack on India's parliament that New Delhi blamed on Pakistan-based Kashmiri militants.

Tensions soared again after an attack by Islamic militants on an Indian army base in Kashmir on May 14.

India said on Sunday it was running out of patience over the attacks by extremists who it says are supported by Pakistan.

But Indian Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee said New Delhi would first wait to see whether international efforts to persuade Pakistan to crack down on militants bore fruit.

"War is not going to serve anyone," U.S. National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice told 'Fox News Sunday'.

"There are very intensive and coordinated efforts right now between the United States, Great Britain, the European Union and, indeed, the Russians to try and calm this crisis," she said, speaking from Russia.

U.S. President George W. Bush, who arrived in Paris on Sunday from Russia, and French President Jacques Chirac urged Pakistan to halt incursions by militants across the Line of Control separating Indian and Pakistan-controlled areas of Kashmir.

Analysts see a small window of opportunity, perhaps lasting two weeks, perhaps two months, to prevent war between the two countries.

Vajpayee told troops last week to prepare for a "decisive fight", stoking fears of war. The two have already fought three wars -- two over disputed Kashmir -- since independence in 1947.

"The talk of war, that's the background noise, and that will continue," Indian defence analyst C. Rajamohan said.

"But we have moved on to the diplomatic game, that's where the activity is now," he said.

Much attention will be focused on Musharraf's speech.

In January, just weeks after the attack on India's parliament, Musharraf also addressed the nation, condemning terrorism in all its forms and announcing a sweeping crackdown on militant groups.

Thousands of militants were rounded up and held for several months and their offices closed, but India said the crackdown was largely ineffective. It says large numbers of Pakistan-based militants are still crossing into Indian-ruled Kashmir.

India says the three gunmen who raided an Indian army base in Kashmir on May 14, killing 31 people, were Pakistan-based militants. The gunmen died in the attack.

Although Pakistan has denied involvement and condemned the attacks on parliament and the raid on the army camp, New Delhi says Musharraf has not done enough to curb attacks by militants.

The latest missile tests have also hardened views within the Indian government that its long-time rival is not serious about easing tensions.

Pakistan said it had successfully fired the short-range Hatf-3 (Ghaznavi) ballistic missile on Sunday as part of a series of tests that are set to end on Tuesday.

The missile, named after Mahmud Ghaznavi, an 11th-century Afghan invader of the Indian subcontinent, would be best suited for targeting large military convoys, military experts said.

The tests began on Saturday with the launch of the medium-range Ghauri missile -- which has a range of 1,500 km (940 miles) -- that some experts believe capable of firing nuclear warheads at Indian cities.

"The tests are basically meant as a projection of power," Najam Sethi, editor of Pakistan's Friday Times told Star News.

"India has massed lots of troops on the border and successfully created the perception of power. And so I think there was an attempt to counter that and that has been done."

India has dismissed the missile tests as being meant to placate Pakistan's domestic audience, while the United States and Russia have called on Pakistan to stop them.

Pakistan said Indian troops shelled across the tense military control line in Kashmir on Sunday, killing two people and injuring several others on its side of the disputed region. 

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