The exchange came as US President George W. Bush told reporters Thursday in Crawford, Texas that Pakistan's nuclear arsenal was "secure" in the wake of two assassination attempts against the nation's president, Pervez Musharraf, in the last three weeks.

The Indian government handed its list to a Pakistani diplomat in New Delhi on Thursday. The Pakistani government gave the information to an Indian diplomat in Islamabad on the same day, the Indian statement late Thursday said.

Since April, the South Asian neighbours have been engaged in a series of fence-mending moves after coming to the edge of their fourth war in 2002.

The two nations have fought three full-fledged wars, two over the Himalayan region of Kashmir which they both claim.

The countries are required to give each other the latest information about their nuclear facilities at the start of the new year under the accord signed in 1988 and ratified in 1991. The first such exchange was carried out in 1992.

India shocked the world in 1998 when it staged five nuclear tests and declared itself a nuclear power. Pakistan replied days later with its own tests.

The list exchanged by the two countries covers nuclear power plants as well as research installations. India provided details of 10 nuclear installations last year while Pakistan gave a list of six nuclear facilities. There was no immediate information about whether this year's list contained any additions.

Vajpayee told the news magazine India Today in this week's edition there was no threat of a nuclear conflict with Pakistan.

"The only button I will press is of an electronic voting machine," said Vajpayee, whose Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party-led government is expected to call early elections for April or May. "It is madness even to contemplate nuclear war. Our nuclear weapons are meant to be a deterrent."