NEW DELHI — India's prime minister called on Pakistan to wake up and tackle the "monster of terrorism" that threatens not only itself but the South Asian region, a report said Saturday.
"As Pakistan's neighbour we have great worries about the terror machine that is still intact in Pakistan," Premier Minister Manmohan Singh was quoted as saying by the Press Trust of India.
Singh, who was returning home from Africa after a six-day trip, used his strongest language yet about Islamist militant activities in Pakistan.
"The more I see of what is happening in Pakistan, the more I am convinced that Pakistan's leadership must now wake up," to the threat posed by militants, Singh said.
New Delhi has long accused its neighbour of harbouring militant groups, but analysts say it is becoming increasingly concerned that growing unrest in Pakistan could compromise the safety of the country's nuclear arsenal.
India was particularly alarmed by a 17-hour Taliban siege of a strategic Pakistan naval air base last weekend in which heavily armed militants destroyed two surveillance planes and killed 10 personnel.
New Delhi has also been shaken by the revelation that Al-Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden, killed by US forces earlier this month, was living in a Pakistani military garrison town just two hours' drive from the capital Islamabad.
"We must convince Pakistan it is in their own interest that they must help us in tackling the problem of terror in the region," Singh said in the report.
Pakistan needs to "recognise this monster of terrorism which they unleashed at one time is hurting them as much as it can hurt our country," he added.
Nuclear-armed India and Pakistan have fought three wars since independence from Britain in 1947.
A stop-start peace process is officially back on, but ties remain frosty.
India broke off formal peace talks with its neighbour after the 2008 Mumbai attacks that killed 166 people and which New Delhi blamed on the Pakistan-based Lashkar-e-Taiba guerrilla force and the Pakistani intelligence service.
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