ISLAMABAD, 15 January 2004 — Pakistan and India agreed yesterday to continue for another five years a cross-border bus service that was recently restored after tensions eased between the South Asian neighbors, officials said.

The agreement was reached after two days of talks between transport officials from the two countries in Rawalpindi, a city near the Pakistani capital Islamabad. They will also consider running more buses in the future. Train service between Lahore and Attari will resume today.

The twice-a-week bus service first started in 1999 after Indian Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee traveled to Pakistan’s eastern city of Lahore for talks with then Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif. The talks, however, failed to achieve a breakthrough in resolving five decades of bitter relations.

The bus service was suspended two years ago when the two sides severed air and ground links following an attack by militants on India’s Parliament, which was blamed by New Delhi on two Pakistan-based militant groups. Pakistan denied involvement.

In recent months, tensions have eased, and in July 2003 the bus service resumed, traveling again from Lahore to New Delhi, India’s capital.

The existing agreement on the service had been due to expire Feb. 15.

“The two sides also agreed to consider running more buses,” said a Pakistani transport official, who did not want to be named. He did not give any other details.

A.J.S. Sahney, chairman of the Delhi Transport Corporation, and Malik Mohammed Habib, managing director of the Pakistan Tourism Development Corporation, led the two sides in the talks this week.

The bus and train services in particular are used by thousands of people to visit their friends and relatives who were divided by the partition of the Indian subcontinent into India and Pakistan when Britain granted independence in 1947.

The two countries have fought three wars since then, but hopes for an end to the hostility between the nuclear-armed nations have surged since Pakistani President Gen. Pervez Musharraf and Vajpayee agreed earlier this month to resume peace talks. Pakistan and India resumed air links at the start of this year.