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India renews contact

with millitant

in Kashmi

SRINAGAR, India, Aug 29 (Reuter) - Indian authorities held a fresh round of talks on Tuesday with militants holding four Westerners hostage in Kashmir amid hopes the tourists, in their ninth week of captivity, would be released unharmed.

Officials spoke by radio with Al-Faran militants who kidnapped the Westerners in isolated Kashmir in early July.

The latest communication came one day after American Donald Hutchings spoke directly to Indian officials, telling them by radio that he was in good health, as were German Dirk Hasert and Britons Keith Mangan and Paul Wells.

That was the first direct contact between the government and the hostages since the men were abducted and fanned hopes Al-Faran would eventually agree to free the tourists.

"This is another positive development," a senior official of the government of Jammu and Kashmir state said. "We are happy that despite all the deadlines and threats against them, we were able to talk to a hostage and prolong the negotiations."

The government contacted the abductors again on Tuesday, a state government spokesman said. "We are talking," he said. "We hope that things move quickly, but it is a long, drawn-out process and one has to show patience."

A fifth hostage, Norwegian Hans Christian Ostroe, was found beheaded in a remote region of Kashmir on August 13.

Near his body was a note in which Al-Faran threatened to kill the others unless the government released 15 jailed separatists within two days.

That deadline, like two earlier ones, passed without any apparent harm being done to the hostages as Indian negotiators stepped up efforts to reach a peaceful end to the ordeal, which entered its ninth week on Tuesday.

The government had requested proof that the four men were unharmed in spite of death threats. A tape recording and photographs released last week indicated the men were in good health, but they dated from August 18, two days before yet another death threat.

In Monday's radio conversation, Hutchings told authorities he and the other hostages were in good health.

Officials seeking proof the others were alive and well asked Hutchings personal questions about them which only they could answer.

Officials would not say if they expected the responses in writing, on a tape recording or over radio.

Despite the upbeat mood in Srinagar, summer capital of Jammu and Kashmir, authorities said they did not necessarily expect an early resolution to the crisis. "These things take time," one official said. "We have to have a lot of patience and prolong the negotiations."

India has rejected a swap of jailed militants for the hostages, saying it would only encourage more abductions in Kashmir, where police and hospitals say more than 20,000 people have died in a five-year separatist revolt.

But it has said a possible agreement could involve the release of the hostages and jailed separatists who might have been freed under a regular review of their prison status.-Reuter