TITHWAL, Nov 21: Nine more people on Monday walked across the heavily militarized border in disputed Kashmir in a further sign of easing tensions. Indian officials said a Pakistani man and a woman returning home crossed the LoC while five men and two women from occupied Kashmir were also allowed to cross from the Indian to Pakistani zone of the Himalayan region.

“We escorted the nine to the border after we were told that Pakistan had agreed to allow members of divided families to cross the LoC and meet relatives,” said Indian army Colonel Sant Kumar in the Poonch district.

He said the two Pakistanis had come from Azad Kashmir aboard a trans-border bus before the Oct 8 quake and had been stranded in occupied Kashmir.

“The last two years have been the most peaceful ones in our lives,” said 35-year-old shopkeeper Anwar Sidiq. “We used to live under constant fear of incoming shells from there,” he said, pointing to the Pakistan zone.

“But it has stopped. We have no words to thank the two countries.”

Two dozen Indian Kashmiris made history on Saturday when they walked over a 175-feet bridge from Tithwal to the village of Chilyana in Azad Kashmir to look for their missing relatives and mourn the dead.

The villages, on either side of the Kishen Ganga river that marks the ceasefire line, were among the worst hit by artillery duels before the truce.

“We were living in hell before the ceasefire. Now it is calm, except that it will take us some time to rebuild our homes destroyed by the quake,” said Sidiq’s mother Asmat Begum, 45.

The family’s home was destroyed in the quake and they now live in a tent.

Tithwal is now a symbol of the peace effort, with regular meetings between Indian and Pakistani army and civilian officials who stop to photograph each other.

“This border is melting. It is great. Brother is able to see his brother,” said Imtiaz Ahmed, a porter who has been carting relief goods from the Indian side to the Pakistani zone.

SHOT DEAD: Indian police have shot dead a suspected militant during a gunbattle in Srinagar, police said on Monday.

The fighting erupted when counter-insurgency police raided a rebel hideout in Srinagar late Sunday.

“During the gunbattle a militant was killed and two policemen injured,” a police spokesman said, adding the slain militant was a member of the Jaish-i-Mohammed.—AFP