That talk has alarmed American officials, who fear it reflects a softening stance toward the militants just as President Pervez Musharraf has given the Bush administration a freer hand to strike at militants using pilotless Predator drones. Many Pakistanis, however, are convinced that the surge in suicide bombings %26#151; 17 in the first 10 weeks of 2008 %26#151; is retaliation for three Predator strikes since the beginning of the year. The spike in attacks, combined with the crushing defeat of Mr. Musharraf%26#8217;s party in February parliamentary elections, has brought demands for change in his American-backed policies. Speaking in separate interviews, the leaders of Pakistan%26#8217;s new government coalition %26#151; Asif Ali Zardari of the Pakistan Peoples Party and Nawaz Sharif, head of the Pakistan Muslim League-N %26#151; tried to strike a more independent stance from Washington and repackage the conflict in a more palatable way for Pakistanis. They said they were determined to set a different course from that of President Musharraf, who has received generous military financial help of more than $10 billion from Washington for his support. %26#8220;We are dealing with our own people,%26#8221; said Mr. Sharif, who was twice prime minister in the 1990s. %26#8220;We will deal with them very sensibly. And when you have a problem in your own family, you don%26#8217;t kill your own family. You sit and talk. After all, Britain also got the solution of the problem of Ireland. So what%26#8217;s the harm in conducting negotiations?%26#8221; Mr. Zardari said: %26#8220;Obviously what they have been doing for the last eight years has not been working. Even a fool knows that.%26#8221; The war against the insurgents has to be redefined, he said, as %26#8220;Pakistan%26#8217;s war%26#8221; for a public that has come to resent the conflict as being pushed on the country as part of an American agenda. It should be dealt with by talks and the use of a beefed-up police force rather than the army, he said. Washington opposed past negotiations because in its view short-term peace deals between the militants and the Pakistani military were a sign of weakness and resulted in the militants%26#8217; winning time to fortify themselves. The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Adm. Mike Mullen, said on a visit to Islamabad last month that talks with the militants were not helpful in the %26#8220;short term.%26#8221; In general terms, according to a retired senior Pakistani general who remains close to the current military leadership, new negotiations would be likely to involve a ban on non-Pakistani militants %26#151; like Afghans, Uzbeks and Chechens %26#151; coming from southern Afghanistan into Pakistan, in return for reduced operations by the Pakistani Army in the tribal areas. But precisely how those talks would be different from the negotiations that led to failed peace deals under Mr. Musharraf is not entirely clear, except that negotiators would represent the newly elected government rather than the military government of the past eight years. Neither Mr. Zardari nor Mr. Sharif was specific about whom among the militant groups in Pakistan%26#8217;s tribal areas they favored talking to. Nor was it clear what kind of formula or quid pro quo the two political leaders had in mind for the talks. Mr. Sharif, whose Islamic religious background is conservative, refused to say whether he would negotiate with Baitullah Mehsud, the Pakistani Taliban leader whom the government blames for many if not most of the recent suicide bomb attacks in Pakistan. American and Pakistani terrorism experts have said they believe that Mr. Mehsud was behind the assassination of the opposition leader Benazir Bhutto in December, and that he works in tandem with Al Qaeda. %26#8220;Nobody gave me any presentation on this subject,%26#8221; Mr. Sharif said. Asked whom the negotiations would be held with, Mr. Sharif replied: %26#8220;With all the concerned elements. I don%26#8217;t think guns and bullets have so far produced any positive results.%26#8221; Any result that smacks of Pakistan%26#8217;s ceding further control over the tribal areas is not one likely to be welcomed in Washington. The Bush administration views the tribal areas as a sanctuary for Taliban forces who cross the border into Afghanistan to fight American and NATO forces, as well as a base for Al Qaeda to plot new terrorist attacks in the United States and Europe. Pakistanis, however, have come to see the tribal areas as something entirely different: a once peaceful region where a group of militants have turned their wrath on the rest of the country as punishment for the American alliance. Many civilians were among the 274 people killed since the beginning of the year, but the dead also included young soldiers and policemen, according to a tally by the Pakistani newspaper Dawn. A bomb explosion last Saturday at an Italian restaurant favored by foreigners in Islamabad wounded four F.B.I. agents and underscored for Pakistanis yet again the American involvement here. Washington may have little choice but to adjust to the new policies, said a retired Pakistani Army brigadier, Mehmood Shah, who was in charge of security in the tribal areas. Of the new Pakistani government, Mr. Shah said: %26#8220;They will not like to be seen as dictated to by the United States. They would like it to be seen as %26#8216;our war.%26#8217; %26#8221; 1 2 Next Page %26#x00bb;
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