The US has said it has taken 'seriously' India's assertion that it reserved the right to launch a pre-emptive strike against Pakistan and advised the two countries to ensure that the situation does not 'get out of hand'.

A senior unnamed US state department official, quoted by Pakistan's Dawn newspaper, also said the infiltration of militants into Jammu and Kashmir 'has not stopped as yet and it is something we have said needs to stop'.

About External Affairs Minister Yashwant Sinha's remarks that India reserved the right to launch a pre-emptive attack against Pakistan just as the US did against Iraq, the official said Washington is 'in pretty regular touch with both governments to ensure that the situation does not get out of hand. Threats of war are always something taken seriously'.

"We recognise the very serious nature of the situation in Kashmir as our recent joint statement with Britain made clear but the two situations were not comparable," he said.

"Attempts to draw parallel between Iraq and Kashmir are overwhelmed by differences between the two situations."

Elaborating the US point of view, he said, "Iraq invaded, occupied and brutalised Kuwait in 1990."

"A decade earlier Iraq had attacked another neighbour Iran and used chemical weapons against it, and against thousands of its own citizens," he said.