The former secretary of Northern Ireland thinks that we should negotiate with bin Laden.

In a television interview which will be broadcast on Easter Sunday, she described the current hardline approach to the war on terror as "completely counter-productive".

Ms Mowlam told Tyne Tees TV's Sunday Interview that Britain and America must open a dialogue with their enemies.

Interviewer Tony Cartledge asked if she could imagine "al Qaida and Osama bin Laden arriving at the negotiating table".

She replied: "You have to do that. If you do not you condemn large parts of the world to war forever.

"Some people couldn't conceive of Gerry Adams or Martin McGuinness getting to the table but they did."

She added: "If you go in with guns and bombs, you act as a recruitment officer for the terrorists."

I was amused by this aside at the end of the column:

She also confirmed on the programme that she has completely recovered from a brain tumour.

I'd say that we have some evidence to the contrary here.

For negotiations to work, each side has to have something the other wants. What do we have that the terrorists want?(besides our lives)

Perhaps she needs to read some comments from the Islamists. This one will do nicely:

"We are not fighting so that you will offer us something. We are fighting to eliminate you."
--Hussein Massawi, former leader of Hezbollah

Not much room for diplomacy there, hmm?

No, I think she has something there. Having al Qaida and bin Laden arriving at a negotiating table would make things much easier than running all over the countryside trying to find them. Negotiation would be short, swift, extremely effective and conclusive. Now if we can just get them to come ...

One of bin Laden's major "complaints" was that the U.S. stationed troops on Islamic holy land in Saudi Arabia. I find it hard to believe that bin Laden et al were hellbent on destroying the U.S. from the beginning. Rather, they perceived the presence in the Middle East as imperialistic, and when their governments failed to address certain grievences (e.g., stop setting up base on our land), they turned to terrorism. Not that their actions are justified (whatever that means), but I don't think it's accurate to assume that the annihilation sentiment was spontaneous. Both sides are guilty of various wrongdoings, but it's not entirely clear whether a negotion plea from either side would predicate a peace plan (note that the US is just as adamant about destroying the fundamentalists as they are about destroying the US).