Updated May 10, 2025 at 1:56 PM MDT
LAHORE, Pakistan – After days of escalating hostilities between nuclear armed India and Pakistan, President Trump announced Saturday that the U.S. had mediated an immediate ceasefire. It brought to a conclusion — for now — the most serious intensification of fighting between the two nuclear-armed rivals since they went to war in 1971.
"Congratulations to both countries for using Common Sense and Great Intelligence," he said in a post on the platform Truth Social. Minutes later, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said in a statement that he and Vice President Vance had been in touch with top officials of the two countries over the past two days, including prime ministers Narendra Modi of India and Shehbaz Sharif of Pakistan.
India's foreign secretary Vikram Misri confirmed the news in a short press briefing, telling journalists, "It was agreed that both sides would stop all firing and military action on land and in the air and the sea" starting at 5 p.m. Indian standard time.
But only hours after the ceasefire was announced, residents in a major town in Indian-held Kashmir reported hearing blasts and flashes streak through the sky. It was unclear if the blasts represented a collapse of the ceasefire or a breach. Pakistani and Indian officials have so far not commented.
Late Saturday, India's foreign secretary Vikram Misri cited "repeated violations" by Pakistan of the ceasefire agreement. "We call upon Pakistan to take appropriate steps to address these violations and deal with the situation with seriousness and responsibility," he said.
The ceasefire announcements came after a day of worrying violence — India announced it had struck Pakistani military air bases early Saturday, including one of the country's most important bases near the capital Islamabad — an escalation that Pakistan said it could not ignore.
Pakistan announced its own operation, "Iron Wall," a rough translation of the phrase, "Bunyan Marsus," from the Muslim holy book, the Quran. "This operation that we started today — it will all end in some way. It all depends on what India wants," said the Pakistani foreign minister and deputy prime minister, Ishaq Dar, speaking to local news outlet Geo. Soldiers filmed themselves firing projectiles at India and cheering.
The latest round of tensions began after gunmen opened fire on tourists in Indian-held Kashmir, killing 26 people in late April. India said the group that claimed responsibility was a proxy for Pakistan's army. Pakistan denied any connection.
Starting overnight Wednesday, India began military strikes using missiles, and then drones, against Pakistan in what it said was retaliation for the April attack. The two countries had exchanged fire every night since. More than 70 people were killed on both sides, most of them in Kashmir, a Himalayan territory divided between India and Pakistan and claimed by both.
It is not clear under what terms both countries agreed to a ceasefire. Misri, the Indian foreign secretary, said the two sides would talk again on Monday.
But Reuters reported that a series of measures that both sides had announced following the April 22 militant attack would not be reversed — including cancelling the visas of Pakistanis and Indians in each others' territories, downsizing their embassies and perhaps most crucially, India's suspension of a decades-old water treaty with Pakistan that divides six South Asian rivers between them.
In some ways, the ceasefire took many by surprise.
The U.S. intervenes
In previous escalations in South Asia, Washington had intervened more robustly to end hostilities. But on Thursday, there was little expectation America would step in with any intensity after Vice President JD Vance told Fox News: "What we can do is try to encourage these folks to de-escalate a little bit, but we're not going to get involved in the middle of a war that's fundamentally none of our business and has nothing to do with America's ability to control it."
But Abdullah Khan, an analyst with the Pakistan Institute for Conflict and Security Studies, told NPR that the U.S. appeared to be watching and waiting. "Ultimately when they felt that the situation was escalating," he said, Washington "intervened directly as well as through their Arab allies. And then eventually they convinced both the parties to de-escalate for a ceasefire."
Khan said both Pakistan and India could now sell this ceasefire as a victory for their side: In Pakistan, a far smaller country than India, the military could show that it had not cowed to its powerful neighbor. And India could tell its citizens that Pakistan had been taught a lesson.
And both countries, Khan said, could not afford to continue. India is trying to capture manufacturing that companies are trying to shift from China as Trump's tariffs come into force.
Pakistan "has its own problems at the moment, facing economic problems as well as the wave of terrorism at home," Khan said, referring to active conflicts against separatists in its western province and against pro-Taliban militants along its border with Afghanistan. "Both the countries have their problems, which also compelled them to listen very easily to those who came for the face-saving," he said.
Regardless he said, South Asians were breathing a sigh of collective relief. "Everybody is happy that it ended," he said.
Bilal Kuchay contributed reporting from Srinagar, India. Diaa Hadid contributed reporting from Mumbai, and Omkar Khandekar from New Delhi, India.
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