ISLAMABAD -- Despite initial setbacks, patient back-channeling efforts obviously have succeeded since both the Pakistani government and the militant group of Pakistani Taliban expressed their willingness to hold direct peace talks.

Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan said that a new government panel for direct peace negotiations with Tehrik-e- Taliban Pakistan (TTP) would be announced in a few days.

The Taliban has already extended invitation to the government for a face-to-face meeting with the Taliban leaders in northwest tribal region to discuss formal dialogue, a Taliban mediator, Prof. Muhammad Ibrahim, told Xinhua on Wednesday.

Ibrahim, who travelled to Waziristan late last month and met members of the Taliban political council, said he was hopeful the talks would finally move forward.

The Taliban has proposed that South Waziristan, their birthplace, would be the venue for the formal talks.

There has been ups and downs in the complicated peace talks but neither sides want a total collapse.

At one stage the government team refused to talk with the Taliban mediators after the Taliban executed 23 security personnel who had been held hostage since 2010, and after they bombed a police bus, killing 13 police officers.

The impasse ended after the Taliban unilaterally declared a month-long ceasefire on March 1. In response, the government ordered suspension of airstrikes against the Taliban in Waziristan.

A team of government negotiators started talks with the Taliban intermediaries last month to end the longstanding conflict which has claimed thousands of lives and badly affected the county's economy.

Officials said that since the Taliban has declared a ceasefire without conditions, it is now time for direct talks to start.

The government of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif has now adopted a new strategy to give a befitting response to the Taliban and target them in their bases if they carry out attack on security forces.

Sharif has also made it clear that the "use of force" would be the option if the current chance of peace dialogue could not work.

Pakistani security establishment is now determined to secure all tribal regions bordering Afghanistan to avoid instability after the withdrawal of NATO troops from Afghanistan at the end of this year.