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New Delhi (AFP) July 21, 2010 A daily, goose-stepping display of choreographed aggression by soldiers on the India-Pakistan border has been toned down because of knee injuries to the participants, a report said Wednesday. For years, the military flag-lowering ceremony that takes place every evening at the Wagah border post has drawn crowds of partisan tourists who cheer every hostile strut and stare traded by the border guards on both sides. Despite the ritualised hostility, the show and the atmosphere surrounding it is one of good-natured rivalry and, according to the Hindustan Times, the two sides have now reached an agreement to take things a little easier. "We had proposed a lowering of the aggression in the gestures during the daily parade, and subsequently took a unilateral decision to implement that," a senior Indian Border Security Force officer, Himmat Singh, told the Times. "Now, the Pakistan Rangers have also agreed to the proposal, and toned down their drill," Singh said. The motivation for the change was more medical than diplomatic. The exaggerated boot-stomping that was a major feature of the ceremony had, Singh said, resulted in guards on both sides suffering "mild-to-severe" damage to joints in the lower half of their bodies, particularly the knees. India and Pakistan have fought three wars since the division of the subcontinent in 1947. The nuclear-armed rivals are currently moving, albeit very slowly, towards reviving a peace dialogue suspended after the 2008 Mumbai attacks that India blamed on Pakistan-based militants.
earlier related report A Pakistani identified as Nouman, the commander of the Pakistan-based Harkat-ul-Mujahedin rebel group in Indian Kashmir, was killed in an overnight firefight with soldiers, army spokesman J.S. Brar told AFP. Harkat-ul-Mujahedin is one of a number of groups fighting against New Delhi's rule in Muslim-majority Kashmir, which is divided between India and Pakistan. The most powerful group is thought to be Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT). Brar claimed Nouman was "Kashmir valley's top most militant" wanted for a number of attacks, including master-minding a nearly 24-hour siege at a hotel in the centre of Indian Kashmir's main city Srinigar in January. "His death is a big jolt to insurgency in Kashmir," he said. The gunbattle took place in Sopore town, about 50 kilometers (31 miles), north of Srinagar, and also left an unidentified accomplice to Nouman and an Indian soldier dead. More than 47,000 people have died in Kashmir since anti-India militants launched an insurgency in the scenic region in 1989. The violence has declined sharply since India and Pakistan started a slow-moving peace process in 2004. Both nuclear-armed rivals hold the region in part but claim it in entirety.
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