The United Kingdom Foreign Office has rejected the suggestion of talks with a terrorist organization such as al-Qaeda as “inconceivable”.

The Foreign Office has said: "It is inconceivable that Her Majesty's government would ever seek to reach a mutually acceptable accommodation with a terrorist organisation like al-Qaeda."

This was the Foreign Office response to comments by Prime Minister Tony Blair’s former Chief of Staff Jonathan Powell that the UK should talk to al-Qaeda, as reported by BBC.

The Foreign Office view also clashes with the UK Security Minister Lord Brown who, backing Jonathan Powell, has said it would be "silly" to have no communication link whatsoever with terrorist groups such as al-Qaeda, as reported by BBC.

The BBC in a report yesterday (16) commenting the Powell’s suggestion of talks with al-Qaeda, which has been supported by UK’s Security Minister Lord West, quoted a Foreign Office spokesman stating: "It is inconceivable that Her Majesty's government would ever seek to reach a mutually acceptable accommodation with a terrorist organisation like al-Qaeda."

Powell was one of the key negotiators for the UK government in reaching a settlement in Northern Ireland during Mr. Blair's time as Prime Minister.

In an interview with the “Guardian” UK, Jonathan Powell speaking on the policy to be adopted in the Middle East and al-Qaeda now said: “If I was in government now, I would want to have been talking to Hamas, I would be wanting to communicate with the Taliban and I would want to find a channel to al-Qaeda.”

Powell made his comments based on his experience in negotiations with the IRA.

He said: “It's not an easy step to take, and with al-Qaeda there's a practical problem of finding who you want to talk to, how you'd establish a channel. But I would be urging people to make an effort to do that."

Earlier yesterday, the BBC posted this story on its web site highlighting the Foreign Office’s rejection of Jonathan Powell’s suggestion for talks with al-Qaeda. A short while later the story was taken off the web site. The story was brought back still later with the headline highlighting the comment by Lord Brown that not talking to al-Qaeda is “silly”.

The UK authorities have been repeatedly calling on the Sri Lanka Government to negotiate with the LTTE that has been banned by UK and the European Union as an international terrorist organisation. The LTTE is among the largest users of suicide killers in its campaign of separatist terror against the Sri Lanka State.