WASHINGTON, April 25: The United States and Pakistan are working on a new strategy in the tribal area which aims at forcing Al Qaeda to quit the region by driving a wedge between local and foreign militants, diplomatic sources told Dawn.

Under the new strategy, Pakistan is offering a patchwork of peace deals to local Taliban commanders and Pashtun chieftains. Each deal is negotiated separately, emphasising more on local circumstances, than offering a blanket peace agreement to all.

In 2006, Pakistan signed a deal with the militants and persuaded the Americans to back it as well. But by the end of 2006, it became obvious that the deal was not working and the militants were using it to regroup and rearm.

So the United States withdrew its support and persuaded Pakistan to use maximum military force against the militants.

This also failed. So the Pakistanis convinced the Americans to go back to negotiations, albeit with a new strategy.

After studying the previous deal, they concluded that offering a blanket amnesty or a grand deal that applies to all groups will never work.

So they studied the local conditions, focusing on differences between local and foreign militants, conflicts between militants and local tribes, and within the local Taliban groups. This led to the new strategy of negotiating a separate deal with each faction.

The media attention, however, is focuses on Baitullah Mehsud for obvious reasons. Since 2006, he has established himself as the most important Taliban commander in the tribal territory.

Mehsud also is linked to the assassination of former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto while the present government in Islamabad is headed by her party, which makes the story more readable.

But while the media is focuses on Mehsud, Pakistan is quietly working on the local Taliban and tribal leaders to create conditions that would force foreign militants to either leave the area or surrender.

The local Taliban and tribal leaders, as United States Assistant Secretary of State Richard Boucher says, will also be required to “put an end to the cross-border infiltration, an end to the suicide bombs that head into other parts of Pakistan as well as into Afghanistan and an end to the plotting and planning of Al Qaeda from this area.”

Another key factor for the success of this peace effort is to win over as many local Taliban and tribal commanders as possible.

In January 2007, Pakistan succeeded in persuading Mullah Nazir of South Waziristan to oust Uzbek fighters from the area but they went over to Mehsud. Pakistan hopes to use the proposed deals to prevent this in future.

Pakistanis, and their American backers, are hoping that if the new strategy works, they will not only be able to isolate foreign fighters but also use local conflicts to minimize the strength of the militants.

The Americans had tried to isolate Al Qaeda fighters from their local sympathizers in the past as well but it did not work.

Now they are encouraged by a recent success in the Khyber Agency where last week they won over a local Al Qaeda and Taliban backer, Haji Namdar.

Haji Namdar not only exposed the militants who blew up 40 Nato gas tankers at Torkham on March 20 but also led Pakistani paramilitary troops to their safe haven, forcing Al Qaeda to suspend its activities in the Khyber Agency.