Blair arrives for final G8 meeting

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Mr Blair warned Russian President Vladimir Putin that European trade with his country would suffer unless he embraced the continent's common values and principles.

On Thursday he will have breakfast talks with President Bush, his last before the removal vans - which began arriving at No 10 on Wednesday - finally usher him out of Downing Street. And at the two-day gathering of world leaders in Heiligendamm, on Germany's Baltic coast, Mr Blair urgently wants agreement on a way forward on global warming, as well as a further push on his Gleneagles goals on aid to Africa.

His row with Russia stems from President Putin's refusal to extradite ex-KGB agent Andrei Lugovoy, accused of the murder of Alexander Litvinenko in London, and also the Russian president's threat to aim his missiles at Europe if American plans for a defensive missile shield go ahead.

Mr Blair told MPs in the Commons before leaving for Germany: "We want good relations with Russia but that can only be done on the basis we have shared principles and shared values."

If that were not the case, warned the Prime Minister: "The consequence is that people in Europe will want to minimise the business that they do with Russia."

Earlier, Mr Blair told the BBC: "I think the sensible thing, and this is what I'll do certainly when I meet President Putin, is just to have a frank conversation about the state of the relationship between not simply Britain but Europe and Russia."

Those bilateral talks are scheduled to take place shortly before Mr Blair leaves the summit on Friday afternoon.

But they are also certain to dominate his final one-to-one conversation with the US President on Thursday - along with America's latest offer to seek global consensus on climate change, boost its spending to alleviate HIV/Aids suffering in Africa and the latest situation in Iraq and Afghanistan.

On climate change Mr Blair told MPs: "What will be important at the G8 is that for the first time we managed to get agreement on the science of climate change and the fact that it's human activity that's causing it."