LONDON, Aug 11 (Saba) -- Western governments should not rule out talks with al Qaida, former Premier Tony Blair's chief negotiator with the IRA said Wednesday, according to Kuwait News Agency (KUNA).

Jonathan Powell, who was Blair's chief of staff, acknowledged that finding anyone from the terrorist network to negotiate with would be difficult.

But in an interview with the BBC domestic Radio, he insisted that no group should be regarded as being "beyond the pale". "I think no group should be beyond talking to, including al Qaida. Of course one has to be realistic about talking to a group like that would mean," he said. "It would be a very long process of discussion, assuming you could ever find the leadership of such a group."

In practice, he said that negotiations were more likely to take place with al Qaida-affiliated groups, such as Abu Sayyaf in the Philippines or Shahab in Somalia, rather than the central leadership. "Those are the people you will be talking to rather than, probably, Osama bin Laden at the centre," he said.

Powell suggested that opening talks with the Taliban in Afghanistan could prove easier, although again he warned that it would be a lengthy process. "Assuming you can make contact with them, you would then want to have a secret negotiation because anything that takes place in public would be impossible, both for western governments while they are still fighting the Taliban, and of course for the Taliban themselves looking like they are making concessions," he said.

He said that history had shown that effective negotiations could only take place when both sides accepted that they could not win. It was important therefore that Britain and the United States and their allies in the international coalition did not to send out the message that they were pulling out.

"If you think of Malaya, if you think of Cyprus, if think of the Palestinian Protectorate, we didn't say we were going to go, we carried on fighting and we carried on negotiating at the same time," he said. "To be honest, sending a message saying you're going is not terribly helpful to negotiators trying to make peace."

Saba