New Delhi ? The Indian and Pakistani armies agreed to stop firing at each other across their frontier, including in disputed Kashmir, starting at midnight Tuesday in a further easing of tensions between the nuclear-armed neighbors.

The cease-fire, to mark the Eid-al-Fitr festival that ends the Islamic month of Ramadan, is the first between the two armies since an Islamic militant insurgency began in India’s portion of divided Jammu-Kashmir in 1989.

The cease-fire, however, does not include fighting between Indian security forces and Pakistan-based militants in an insurgency that has killed more than 65,000 people in the past 14 years. In the past, militants have declared unilateral cease-fires for the Eid holiday, but they did not do so this year.

The largest Pakistan-based militant group fighting in India’s portion of the divided Himalayan province said its men would keep on fighting.

“This will not make any difference for mujahedeen activities,” Salim Hashmi, a spokesman for Hezb-ul-Mujahedeen, told The Associated Press from Muzaffarabad, the capital of Pakistan-controlled Kashmir.

But the cease-fire marked the latest in a number of incremental steps taken in recent months by South Asian rivals India and Pakistan to reduce tensions between them.

The armies of India and Pakistan fire machine-guns and automatic rifles at each other almost daily. The cease-fire would apply to the entire border, including the disputed frontier dividing Kashmir between the hostile neighbors.

They have fought two wars over the region since independence from Britain in 1947.