'Intervene in Iraq and Syria or Britain will face terror attacks': Blair warns UK should get involved as he defends decision to topple Saddam

Tony Blair this morning said Britain needed to take action in Iraq and Syria - or face terror attacks in at home.The former Prime Minister said the UK needed to intervene to stop a 'total disaster'. He insisted that he was not calling for troops on the ground - but suggested the 'selective use of air power' was one option on the table.

Mr Blair said: 'If we don't deal with the Syria issue then the problems are not just going to be for Syria and for the region, the problems are actually going to come back and they are going to hit us very directly even in our own country.'

He added: 'If you talk to security services in France and Germany and the UK, they will tell you their biggest single worry today returning jihadists fighters - our own citizens by the way - from Syria.

'We have to look at Syria, and Iraq and the region in context. We have to understand what's going on there and engage.'

He said that didn't mean 'ground troops' but it we shouldn't 'wash our hands of it and walk away'.

Mr Blair's remarks this morning come as extremist fighters from the al-Qaida-inspired 'Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant' bear down on Baghdad.