NEW DELHI. Feb 1: A US official on Monday praised the Indian government's response to a recent string of attacks on Christians here, reports AP.

India has been particularly sensitive to the international response to the attacks, which have been blamed on groups with close ties to Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee's Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party. The senior US administration official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Indian leaders themselves had raised the subject during meetings with US Deputy Secretary of State Strobe Talbott, who on Monday ended a four-day visit to New Delhi to discuss nuclear policy.

Christian groups have counted some 100 attacks over the last year ranging from the burning of Bibles to the killing Jan 23 of an Australian Baptist missionary and his two young sons in a remote corner of southeastern India where the missionary had run a leprosy clinic.