AMRITSAR, 14 December 2005 — Drummers and dancers greeted a Pakistani bus as it crossed into India yesterday in the latest step in a slow-moving peace process to establish stronger transport links between the nuclear rivals.
The bus, to ply between the eastern Pakistani city of Lahore and the Indian city of Amritsar in Punjab, was on a trial run and carried nine people, including Pakistani tourism officials. People threw marigold petals on the green and white bus, which had “Dosti” (Friendship) and the flags of both countries painted on it, as it crossed the Wagah border point into Punjab before heading to Amritsar.
A police band beat drums while Punjabi folk artists performed a traditional dance as they escorted it to the Wagah customs office in a test run which followed one by an Indian bus in the opposite direction on Sunday.
A regular, twice-a-week service between the two cities, just 60 km apart, was due to start in the last week of this month, Hashim Khan, director general of the Pakistan Tourism Development Corporation, told reporters before the bus set off.
Pakistan would like visa procedures for tourists from both sides to be made easier and the buses to run every day, Khan said.
India and Pakistan started a bus service in April linking divided Kashmir with a twice-a-month service interrupted by the Oct. 8 earthquake which killed more than 73,000 people in Pakistan and about 1,500 in India..
The disaster also forced the postponement of the Amritsar-Lahore trial run, originally scheduled for October.
The countries will hold talks on Dec. 20-21 in Islamabad to finalize arrangements for a bus link between Amritsar and Nankana Sahib, a town in eastern Pakistan considered holy by followers of the Sikh religion, who live mostly in India.
Despite more transport links and generally warmer ties, the two countries have made little progress on their main dispute over Muslim-majority Kashmir.
