ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — Eight militants, including a commander in Al Qaeda, were killed Tuesday in what residents and a Pakistani security official said was a United States drone strike in the South Waziristan tribal area near this country's Afghan border. The United States has ramped up its campaign of drone attacks against suspected militants in the border areas of Pakistan, but most have been concentrated in North Waziristan, an area that western officials consider the single most important refuge for militants with Al Qaeda and the Taliban. Tuesday's attack was the first in weeks in South Waziristan, a former haven that Pakistan invaded last October.
The drone was believed to have fired two missiles at a compound in a village near Wana, the regional capital. The Qaeda commander, Hamza al-Jufi, had lived in Wana for many years. Most of the other militants killed in the strike lived nearby, though two came from another province, Punjab, said a fighter in the area who visited the site after the attack.
The fighter said that the eight bodies were mutilated beyond recognition but that no one else was wounded in the strike, which leveled the compound in the village, Ghwakhwai. According to some accounts Mr. Jufi was leading a group called Jundullah, which Pakistani security officials said was involved in sectarian violence around the port city of Karachi.
On June 19 militants affiliated with Jundullah barged into the city courts there and freed three of their members from police custody while one arrested militant and a policeman were killed in an exchange of fire. The freed militants had been arrested by the police and were suspected of involvement in episodes of sectarian violence in Karachi.
According to security officials, the militants were working under Mr. Jufi, a well-known figure in South Waziristan who was said to have survived a drone attack in 2008. The area around his base of Wana is controlled by the Waziri commander Maulvi Nazir, who has been accused of sheltering foreign fighters affiliated with Al Qaeda and of sending militants to Afghanistan to fight American-led forces there.