Pakistan, India agree on Kashmir bus

Indian Foreign Minister Natwar Singh (L) is greeted by Pakistani Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz prior to a meeting in Islamabad yesterday. Pakistan and India reached an agreement on a bus service across the military frontier dividing Kashmir when Singh holds key peace talks in Islamabad Wednesday, officials said. PHOTO: AFP

Visiting Indian Foreign Minister Natwar Singh and his Pakistani counterpart Khurshid Kasuri announced the deal at a press conference after talks in Islamabad.

The bus between Srinagar in India's zone of the divided Himalayan territory and Muzaffarabad on the Pakistani side would begin on April 7 and would be run on an entry permit system, they said.

"The governments have agreed to allow travel across the LoC (Line of Control) between Srinagar and Muzaffarabad by bus," said a joint statement by read out Kasuri. The LoC is the de facto border in Kashmir which is divided between the neighbours and claimed by both.

Restarting the service, which was stopped around 50 years ago, will ease travel for thousands of families separated by the Line of Control, the de facto border in the region.

It will also be a major confidence-building measure. Kashmir was the cause of two of the three wars which India and Pakistan have fought since independence from Britain in 1947.

Singh, making the first visit to Pakistan in 15 years by an Indian foreign minister, met President Pervez Musharraf and Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz before his formal talks with Kasuri.

"I am convinced that cooperation between our two countries is not just a desired objective, it is in today's context an imperative," Singh told reporters after the meeting.