India and Pakistan exchanged detained soldiers on Wednesday in a further sign that the cease-fire that ended the most expansive fighting in decades between the nuclear-armed countries was holding.
The exchange happened at the Attari-Wagah border, the main land crossing between India and Pakistan. The Indian Border Security Force said that one of its soldiers had been returned after three weeks of detention. A Pakistani official said that an Indian border guard had been handed over in return for a member of the Pakistani Rangers, a paramilitary force, who had been in Indian custody for almost two weeks.
Each soldier had ventured into the other’s country inadvertently and had been detained in the days leading up to the military confrontation this past week, during which India struck targets inside Pakistan as retaliation for a terrorist attack in April in the Indian part of Kashmir. India blames that attack, which killed 26 civilians, on Pakistan, though Pakistan has denied involvement.
The strikes quickly escalated to an intense, four-day military confrontation between the neighboring countries, the like of which had not been seen in decades. The United States helped broker a cease-fire on Saturday.
A sense of normalcy has begun to return on both sides of the border in the days since the truce. Commercial flights have resumed, and Kashmiris have started returning to homes damaged during the confrontation.