The negotiator

Even 14 years after his release from captivity, Terry Waite is perhaps one of the best-known and most-recognisable faces in Britain.

He has faced accusations of publicity-seeking - "grandstanding", as he calls it - recently and in the years leading up to his kidnap, but both then and now, his public appearances have clearly been for one purpose - to help others.

In the 1980s, getting his face known internationally was the only way to ensure the terrorists recognised him as the person to negotiate with; today he uses his often appalling experiences to teach others the value of negotiation, whether in the business world or the political sphere.

"People do ask why I continue to talk about what happened to me," he says in a rather bemused tone, "but I don't usually stand there and tell 'my story' to an audience - I teach people about negotiating in extreme circumstances."

Today he is involved in Middle East reconciliation and with Hostage UK, an organisation that offers care and support to the families of hostages. He was with the family of Ken Bigley when his execution took place: "The main victims of war are always innocent people," he comments softly.

One of his current projects is helping Israeli and Palestinian children come to terms with the trauma they and their region - have suffered, and he is trying hard to be optimistic about the future there. "There is no chance for peace unless both sides agree to give up violence, and we really need to examine the root causes."

Terry is still massively in favour of negotiation or "preventative diplomacy". He claims the war in Iraq has created a vacuum in which further terrorism can thrive, and that it is now more difficult than ever to negotiate with the perpetrators.

"The situation is now so polarised, it's impossible to even talk to some groups - that's something that has changed worldwide over the last 20 years," he says.

"There's a lot of talk about fighting terror," he continues, "but the important thing is to look at the roots of the violence - no-one blows themselves up without a valid reason." This is a favourite theme of his; in his time as a hostage negotiator, he promoted the building of relationships across cultures by examining the causes of the problem.

While seemingly a rather obvious idea, it's one which is now being widely ignored in the gung-ho era of 'War on Terror'. Terry points out that his way of negotiation, of meeting face to face and finding a solution before any violence, is now unlikely to happen. "That is the tragedy of Iraq," he says sadly. "You cannot stick democracy on a country like a postage stamp on a letter, and this war has not made the world a safer place."

As ever, his strong views are put across in a measured, softly-spoken manner, something which undoubtedly counted in his favour during his dealings with violent men. There is still, I suspect, a certain amount of disappointment, if not downright anger, that in certain situations his methods were frustrated by the machinations of politicians. "Government agendas are not always humanitarian," he comments wryly.

The Iran-Contra affair, in which he was suspected of complicity, led indirectly to his eventual kidnap, since his captors wanted to find out exactly what he knew about America's arms-for-hostages deals. On a less personal level, Terry claims that Colonel Gaddafi, whom he met in Libya 20 years ago, was prepared to build better relations with the West until the talks collapsed under the weight of political heavy-handedness. "We will never know if a little more sensitivity could have prevented the atrocities that followed, such as Libya's support for the IRA," he muses.

Terry says he didn't originally want to get involved in Beirut, but responded to pleas by the family of John McCarthy, who had been taken hostage. It's a testament to his well-maintained public profile that the terrorists invited him to come to Beirut, though their methods were a little extraordinary - after writing a letter and getting the four US hostages to sign it, they wrapped it around a stone and flung it from a speeding car into the doorway of the Associated Press building, knowing it would be discovered and forwarded to its intended recipient.

The tortuous process of establishing contact with the terrorists demonstrates Terry's patience, while his commitment, once involved, withstood the backlash when the Iran-Contra news broke. Falsely informed that one of the hostages was dying, he agreed to the extremely risky idea of meeting the kidnappers, even though he suspected that he might be captured himself.

"The decision was mine - I was already upset by the political trickery that was going on, and I felt that if the hostage died without hope, I would have to live with that for ever," he explains. The rest we know - his capture, interrogation and torture, the long years of solitude in dreadful conditions, the deep resources of faith and memory on which he drew.

"Throughout history, great suffering has led to an emergence of creativity - it need not destroy us," Terry says firmly. "I knew my captors could not take away my soul."

This brings us to the subject of Guantanamo Bay; how does Terry, a man who knows what it is to be incarcerated with no hope of release, feel about the treatment of prisoners there? "Keeping people locked up outside the due process of law is wrong," he says forcefully. "The system of habeas corpus was hard fought for, and it is there to protect all of us. Detention without legal process, and inhuman behaviour toward prisoners, is a sad reflection on what is supposed to be a civilised nation.

"The UK has turned a blind eye to what the US is doing," he continues. "I do not condone terrorism, but we have to uphold the standards of law otherwise we become as bad as the terrorists." And what of the plans for detention without charge and the removal of some prisoners' right to trial in this country? "The more our freedoms are eroded, the more the terrorists have won," says Terry simply.

A humanitarian above all else, Terry Waite still has much to say about world affairs, and there are a fair few world leaders who could learn from his appealing blend of compassion and common sense.

Terry's book, Taken on Trust, is still in print, published by Hodder & Stoughton - order from good bookshops priced £8.99.