WASHINGTON, April 22: Using tribesmen to beat Uzbek militants could actually strengthen the Taliban and consolidate the group's influence in the seven lawless semi-autonomous tribal areas in Pakistan's northwest frontier, The Chicago Tribune reported on Sunday.

In a report from Wana, the newspaper noted that the proverbial tribal “hospitality appears to have run out” and an army of tribesmen was battling Uzbeks who fled Afghanistan after the fall of the Taliban regime there in 2001.

But the report warned that the alliance between the Pakistan Army and local tribal leaders, one of whom is a local Taliban commander, could raise the concerns of Western allies.

The alliance, the newspaper said, may be seen as a success by the Pakistanis.

“But as is often the case in Pakistan, the real situation could be more complex.”

Some locals told the paper that there was no uprising of locals against foreigners, but the army had exploited a tribal split and backed a faction aligned against the Uzbeks.

The Tribune quoted local tribesmen and experts on Waziristan as saying that pushing the foreigners out of South Waziristan could actually strengthen the Taliban, “raising questions about who controls the province and whether cross-border attacks could increase even further.”

The report claimed that Mullah Nazir Ahmad, the cleric leading the South Waziristan tribal militia fighting the Uzbeks, also commands the Taliban in the area.

Local tribesmen told the newspaper that he was connected to the Afghan Taliban and Arab fighters.

"The Uzbeks waged a war against the people and the government, setting up checkpoints, kidnapping people, and no one was safe," said Daktar Khan, a timber trader from South Waziristan.

"For the local people, the Taliban are now doing good. We support the Taliban against the Americans in Afghanistan. Getting rid of Al Qaeda and foreign forces will definitely strengthen the Taliban."

The report said that Western diplomats in Islamabad already worry that Pakistan has ceded too much control of the tribal areas to militants, largely through recent truces in which the army retreats and the tribes step forward to provide security.

The diplomats criticise the truces for creating havens in Pakistan for militants to launch cross-border attacks.

The report, however, noted that Western complaints have frustrated President Musharraf, who has lost about 700 soldiers in fighting in the tribal areas. The report conceded that Pakistani authorities in the tribal areas have an impossible task, “they cannot completely control the border, which splits the Pashtun tribal belt, cutting villages, homes and families in two, while many Pashtuns in Pakistan have always sympathised with the Taliban, a Pashtun-driven movement.”