Tony Blair has signalled that it will be "difficult" but not impossible to press ahead with elections in Iraq following the latest terror attacks. 

In the wake of a series of blasts, the prime minister warned that "extremists and fanatics" are "literally pouring into Iraq".

Quizzed on the timing of elections inside Iraq, he said it was "going to be difficult" to hold elections later this year.

In a calm series of exchanges the opposition leader Michael Howard had called on the prime minister to stress that "we have a continuing duty to the people of Iraq".

He said a democratic solution would be a defeat for the terrorists who are mounting growing attacks in the country.

"It is in fact the prospect of a peaceful and stable Iraq that poses the greatest threat to al Qaeda and their associates," said Howard.

Howard also called on the prime minister to give his support to British forces who are reported to have imprisoned four of the suspected terrorists.

Whilst Blair said he could not give any further information on the terror suspects at this stage, he went on to praise British troops for the"quite magnificent job for the people of this country and Iraq".

He added that Iraqi people should be supported in their attempts to defeat "brutal, evil terrorists" who are seeking to undermine a lasting democratic solution.

Repeating his statement following Tuesday's attacks, he said the situation now represented a "fight between the forces of good and the forces of evil".

Kennedy savaged

Liberal Democrat leader Charles Kennedy renewed his call for the attorney general's advice on the legality of the war in Iraq to be published in full following similar demands from former prime minister John Major.

"Would the prime minister acknowledge now that one former prime minister and two former foreign secretaries have said that the attorney general's legal advice should be published, that he should not continue to resist to do so?" he said.

The prime minister rejected the call arguing that convention had been followed by Major and his ministers while in office.

Kennedy argued there was growing public suspicion of exactly what was in the attorney general's document.

"It is only going to encourage the atmosphere where there are people that aren't believing what they are being told. There will be a growing perception that the attorney general's advice was itself sexed up," he said.

Blair savaged Kennedy for failing to offer his condolences for the bombings in Iraq and Pakistan.

Conspiracy theorists and opponents of the war, the prime minister argued, would not accept whatever the government said.

"When you look at what is at stake in Iraq today, surely the most important thing now is to rebuild that country in the interest of Iraq and the wider world."