India Orders Truce for Muslim Holiday

India announced a one-month unilateral cease-fire in Kashmir, the mountainous region bordering Pakistan where Indian troops have been fighting Muslim separatist rebels for more than a decade. Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee said in New Delhi, the capital, that he would order all Indian security forces to cease operations in Kashmir during the month of Ramadan, an annual Muslim period of fasting and prayer that begins later this month. There was no immediate reaction from any of the Pakistan-based rebel groups.