Blair says UK must stand firm against terrorism

LONDON, Sept 4 (Reuters) Prime Minister Tony Blair said today Britain must stand firm against global terrorism after three British soldiers were killed in Afghanistan and Iraq and a British tourist was shot dead in Jordan.

''It's so important for us to make sure we do stand firm in Afghanistan and stop that country going back to being a training ground for the export of terrorism right around the world'', Blair told BBC television.

The death of the soldiers in Afghanistan and Iraq was ''a terrible tragedy'', Blair said.

''As we can see from events today, in almost every single ...

part of the areas of the world where there are problems, this global terrorism is operating,'' he said.

Global terrorism was trying to stop countries such as Afghanistan from getting on their feet or to kill innocent people as had happened in Jordan, Blair said.

''The purpose of it is to make us lose heart and to make us fearful of standing up for what we know to be right and our response has got to be to hold firm,'' he said.

A British soldier died in a suicide bombing in the Afghan capital Kabul on Monday, along with at least four civilians. Three British soldiers were wounded, a NATO spokesman said.

That came as relatives mourned the deaths of 14 British military personnel killed when a Royal Air Force reconnaissance plane crashed in Afghanistan on Saturday, in Britain's worst single loss in five years in the country.

Thirty-seven British soldiers have died in Afghanistan since 2001, including some from accidents or illness.

Twenty-four of those died since the beginning of August, sparking questions in Britain over whether British forces, deployed in both Iraq and Afghanistan, are over-stretched.

A roadside bomb blasted a British patrol near the southern Iraqi city of Basra, killing two soldiers and seriously wounding a third, a British military spokesman said.

A lone gunman opened fire on a group of foreign tourists in the Jordanian capital Amman, killing a British man and wounding six other people, officials said.

REUTERS AB PM2353