Mullah Mohammad Nazir told a rare press conference in Wana, the main town in South Waziristan tribal district, that he had never met the al-Qaeda chief but would help him in line with local traditions.

"Bin Laden has never come to this area but if he comes here and seeks our protection then according to tribal laws and customs we will protect him," the 32-year-old former Taliban commander said.

"Our traditions and customs demand that we support the oppressed," Nazir said.

Bin Laden carries a 25-million-dollar US bounty on his head and is accused of masterminding the September 11, 2001 attacks on the United States, which killed nearly 3,000 people.

US officials have repeatedly said they believe that the Saudi is hiding in the rugged tribal belt straddling the border between Pakistan and Afghanistan, where conservative ethnic Pashtun tribes hold sway.

Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf said on April 12 that tribal fighters commanded by Nazir and backed by the army had killed 300 Uzbek and other foreign al-Qaeda-linked militants in the past month.

The Pakistani tribesmen had sheltered the Uzbeks after the fall of Afghanistan's Taliban regime in 2001 but fell out violently with them in mid-March and launched a bid to drive them out.

Musharraf said Nazir's actions vindicated Islamabad's policy of signing peace deals with formerly Taliban-supporting tribesmen, including a pact inked in South Waziristan in 2005.