Gunmen attack Indian air base near Pakistan border, six dead

Four gunmen and two guards were killed when unidentified militants attacked an Indian Air Force base near the Pakistan border on Saturday in an apparent challenge to attempts to revive a dialogue between the nuclear-armed neighbors.

Officials said the gunmen, wearing army fatigues, managed to enter the Pathankot air base in India's northwestern state of Punjab before dawn on Saturday. Once inside, they opened fire indiscriminately.

They had earlier hijacked a police officer's car and driven it to the heavily guarded base - tactics used in earlier attacks believed to have been perpetrated by Pakistani-trained militants, Punjab's police chief Suresh Arora told Reuters.

The four gunmen and two guards were confirmed killed, according to a home ministry official.

Sporadic gunfire continued into the day and helicopters flew as an operation continued to comb the base in search of any more gunmen. There was no immediate claim of responsibility.

The attack came a week after Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi made an impromptu visit to Pakistani counterpart Nawaz Sharif, in a bid to revive bilateral talks that had previously been derailed by militant attacks.

"The moment that Modi touched down in Lahore (and probably even before), something like this was doomed to happen," said Michael Kugelman, a South Asia expert at the Wilson Center think tank in Washington.

"At this point, there's sufficient goodwill in India-Pakistan relations to weather this attack. Saboteurs won't win this one," he said.

Home Minister Rajnath Singh said India wanted peace with Pakistan but that any terrorist attack would get "a befitting response". Analysts described Singh's statement as restrained.

Pakistan later condemned the attack and said it wanted to build on the goodwill created in the recent high-level contacts.

"Pakistan remains committed to partner with India as well as other countries in the region to completely eradicate the menace of terrorism," foreign ministry spokesman Qazi Khalilullah said in a series of tweets.