Pakistan put its forces on high alert after someone pretending to be India's foreign minister made a phone call to President Asif Ali Zardari threatening war after the Mumbai attacks began, Dawn newspaper said on Saturday.
"It's true," a diplomat with knowledge of the exchanges told Reuters when asked whether the report was correct.
Dawn said the Nov. 28 caller threatened military action unless Pakistan acted immediately against the perpetrators of the slaughter in Mumbai, launched two days earlier.
For the next 24 hours nuclear-armed Pakistan's air force was put on "highest alert" as the military watched anxiously for any sign of Indian aggression, the report said.
Tensions have been running high since India blamed Islamist militants based in Pakistan for the three-day rampage in its financial capital, which killed 171 people.
"War may not have been imminent, but it was not possible to take any chances," Dawn quoted a Pakistani official as saying.
WAR BY ACCIDENT?
The episode triggered intense international diplomacy, with some world leaders fearing India and Pakistan could slip into an accidental war, the newspaper said.
Dawn said the caller, posing as Indian Foreign Minister Pranab Mukherjee, also tried to telephone U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, but due to specific checks by U.S. officials the call was not put through.
According to Dawn, Rice called Mukherjee in the middle of the night to ask why he had adopted such a threatening tone, but he assured her that he had not spoken to Zardari.
Pakistan's senior envoy to Britain confirmed that Pakistan had feared an attack.
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