Katmandu, Nepal — Foreign ministers from India and Pakistan shook hands, smiled and chatted Wednesday and one Pakistani official said the "ice is melting" between the nuclear-armed neighbors.
But violence persisted, with an attack outside a legislative building in the Indian part of disputed Kashmir.
Pakistani soldiers listen to their commanding officer in Muzafferabad, in Pakistan-controlled Kashmir. Violence continued Wednesday along India-Pakistan border as foreign ministers met for the first time in Nepal.
The encounter between the two men at a regional summit in Nepal was the first direct contact between the two nations since India accused Pakistan of complicity in the deadly attack on India's Parliament last month.
Since then, both nations have moved thousands of troops toward the border, sent home half of each other's diplomats and halted bus, train and air service between their countries.
Suspected Islamic militants detonated two grenades Wednesday near the state legislature in Jammu-Kashmir state, and police said one policeman was killed and 24 others were wounded. Jammu-Kashmir is India's part of the disputed Kashmir region.
There was no immediate comment from India on the attack. However, referring to a suicide bombing on the same building in October and then the attack on the national Parliament Dec. 13, External Affairs Minister Jaswant Singh said last week that Pakistan, and the militants based there, did not understand how seriously India views assaults on its legislative buildings.
With much of the Indian public still awaiting what Indian Defense Minister George Fernandes has promised will be "a befitting reply" to the December attack, Wednesday's assault in Jammu-Kashmir was unlikely to be taken lightly.
There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the two blasts; one was outside the main entrance of the legislature building and the second was outside an abandoned movie theater one-third of a mile away.
In Katmandu, an Indian official who spoke on condition of anonymity said the recent militant attacks had left Foreign Minister Jaswant Singh "in no mood" for a one-on-one meeting at the conference with his Pakistani counterpart, Abdul Sattar.
India has said neither the foreign ministers, nor Indian Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee and Pakistani President Gen. Pervez Musharraf, will have bilateral meetings during the summit. Heads of state in the region are to meet as group over the weekend.
However, Pakistani government spokesman Ashfaq Ahmad Gondal said "The ice is melting. The very fact that both countries agreed to come to the summit is a very positive step."
The summit of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation being held here this week has been delayed for three years because of the border conflict between India and Pakistan and because of the military coup that brought Musharraf to power.
Both nations are part of President Bush's coalition against terrorism, and Musharraf has been praised in Washington for reversing his support of the Taliban regime in Afghanistan.
Vajpayee, however, has told Bush that Pakistan is the chief sponsor of Islamic militant groups who target India.
Pakistan has denied involvement in the December attack on India's Parliament, and said India had provided no proof against the two main Pakistan-based militant groups, who are fighting for Kashmir's merger with Pakistan.
In the past week, however, Islamabad has frozen the accounts of the groups, arrested their leaders and about 50 members. The United States has declared them terrorist organizations.
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