Hours before the arrival of the US President George W Bush, militants ambushed a party of the elite Special Operations Group of the state police and killed two of them at Chankhan Sopore in north Kashmir.
The militants fired from automatic weapons on the cops, who were on a routine patrol in the area on Wednesday morning.
"The two policemen were critically injured and referred to hospital where they succumbed to injuries," a senior police officer said.
The area has been cordoned off.