A sense of normalcy began to return in India and Pakistan on Monday, in a sign that the cease-fire that halted the most expansive fighting between the two nuclear-armed neighbors in decades would extend past the weekend.
Stock markets in both countries jumped on the first day of trading since the agreement was announced late on Saturday. India announced the resumption of civilian flights at over 30 airports in the north of the country. The authorities in Pakistan said that all airports in the country were open.
The situation along the two countries’ extensive boundary remained tenuous, with tens of thousands of people still displaced from their homes. But there were no reports of a major breach on Sunday night, the second evening of the cease-fire, the result of a diplomatic push from the United States.
For most of last week, the two countries were engaged in intense fighting that brought cross-border shelling and claims from both sides that they had inflicted damage on the other’s military bases. Both sides said that their military leaders would speak again on Monday and assess the agreement’s future. But as of Monday afternoon, there was no update from either nation.
Still, there was optimism in financial markets. Pakistani stocks soared, with the Karachi 100 index gaining almost 9 percent, a record. But trading was halted because the market rose by so much and so fast. India’s markets, which are about 12 times the size of Pakistan’s, also jumped and more than erased last week’s losses.
The recent conflict was triggered by a horrific terrorist attack late last month on the Indian side of Kashmir, a territory claimed by both countries. New Delhi blamed the carnage on groups that it said were receiving support from Pakistan — an accusation Islamabad has denied — and vowed retaliation.
Two weeks after the massacre, near the town of Pahalgam, India bombed what it described as terror facilities in Pakistan. The two countries have fought several wars against each other and have engaged in periodic clashes closer to the line that divides Kashmir between them. But last week’s airstrikes hit the deepest targets that India had struck in mainland Pakistan in at least half a century.
Pakistan retaliated soon after. While the traditional artillery shelling along the border caused the largest number of civilian casualties, the face-off escalated rapidly in the skies, including the heavy use of drones and so-called loiter munitions to target each other’s military bases.
On Saturday, President Trump announced that the two sides had agreed to a cease-fire with the help of U.S. mediation, continuing past patterns of outside mediation to calm things down between the two countries.
Alex Travelli contributed reporting from New Delhi, Showkat Nanda from Jammu and Kashmir, and Salman Masood from Islamabad, Pakistan.
Mujib Mashal is the South Asia bureau chief for The Times, helping to lead coverage of India and the diverse region around it, including Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Nepal and Bhutan.
Hari Kumar covers India, based out of New Delhi. He has been a journalist for more than two decades.
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