July 10 (Bloomberg) -- U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates said there is no evidence ``foreign agents'' were involved in a suicide bomb attack on the Indian embassy in Kabul, after the Afghan government blamed Pakistani intelligence services.

``I haven't seen any evidence or proof that foreign agents were involved,'' Gates told reporters yesterday in Washington when asked about the July 7 car bombing that killed more than 50 people in the deadliest attack in the Afghan capital since the fall of the Taliban in 2001.

Pakistan has denied allegations by President Hamid Karzai's administration that its agents were behind the blast. The two nations have traded blame over the Taliban insurgency, criticizing the other for failing to stop militants crossing their mountainous frontier.

The government in Islamabad has denied backing insurgents in Afghanistan and said it has provided only moral support to militants fighting Indian rule in Jammu and Kashmir state, part of the Himalayan region of Kashmir claimed by Pakistan and India.

``No one should indulge in the blame game rather than fight this menace jointly,'' Pakistani Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani told reporters yesterday in Kuala Lumpur, where he attended a summit of the Eight Islamic Developing Countries group, the official Associated Press of Pakistan reported.

Death Toll

About 100 kilograms (220 pounds) of explosives were used in the embassy attack, which killed 58 people, Indian state-run broadcaster Doordarshan reported on its Web site.

Indian officials sent to Kabul to investigate the blast met with Afghan authorities to discuss security at the mission and Indian nationals in Kabul.

About 3,000 Indians are working on reconstruction and development projects in Afghanistan, according to Doordarshan. Taliban fighters have targeted Indian nationals in the past, particularly personnel building a highway between Delaram and Zeranj in southern Nimroz province.

A bomb was found on a bus transporting 12 Indian road workers traveling to Nimroz a day after the Kabul blast, Doordarshan said.

Pakistan and Afghanistan have pledged to work together to fight the Taliban. President Pervez Musharraf and Karzai set up of a 50-member group of tribal elders from both countries last year to help close terrorist training camps along the 2,430- kilometer (1,510-mile) frontier.

Tribal Leaders

Tribal leaders from both countries will meet in Islamabad soon to follow up on a meeting, known as the Grand Jirga, held in Kabul last August, APP reported.

Pakistan's Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi and his Afghan counterpart Rangin Dadfar Spanta met yesterday at the United Nations in New York and discussed how to strengthen cooperation and the exchange of intelligence, APP said.

While Musharraf ended support for the Taliban after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks and is regarded by the U.S. as a key ally in the war on terrorism, the Pentagon says militants have established bases in Pakistan's tribal regions.

Gilani's government, made up of parties that defeated Musharraf loyalists in February elections, began truce talks with militants in April in an effort to cut terrorist attacks that killed more than 2,000 people in Pakistan last year.

The Bush administration and North Atlantic Treaty Organization are critical of the negotiations, saying they could give insurgents a freer hand. Terrorist incidents in eastern Afghanistan were 50 percent higher in April than the same month in 2007, according to NATO.

Alliance and Afghan forces killed a Taliban commander, Mohammed Daud Rahimi, in an operation yesterday in Logar province, south of Kabul, NATO said in an e-mailed statement. Rahimi recruited fighters and helped plan suicide attacks in the capital, it said.

To contact the reporter on this story: Ed Johnson in Sydney at ejohnson28@bloomberg.net.

Last Updated: July 9, 2008 21:17 EDT