Mortar blast as Blair thanks troops

Two mortar rounds exploded, rocking the building. There were not believed to be any injuries and Mr Blair was in no danger. The base, HQ of multinational force south-east, typically receives two such attacks every day.

Earlier Mr Blair insisted there were "real signs of change and progress" in Iraq - despite the deadly violence scarring daily life in the capital. He brushed aside a mortar attack on Baghdad's heavily-fortified Green Zone minutes before he arrived in the country to have talks with Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Maliki and President Jalal Talabani.

Afterwards, Mr Blair told a news conference: "The question is, what are we going to do in the face of these attacks? The answer is, we don't give in to them.

"The very purpose of the attacks, the suicide bombs, the mortars aimed in here, is so that you will carry nothing but that on your news and won't actually talk about the progress that's happening here."

Mr Blair insisted: "The future of Iraq should be determined by Iraqis in accordance with their wishes, and it's important that all the neighbouring countries respect that."

Later in the day he told hundreds of servicemen and women gathered at the British HQ in Basra that he wanted to take a last chance to thank them before leaving Number 10 next month.

He was speaking on the final leg of his visit to Iraq. Mr Blair told the troops: "This will be my last chance to say thank you for the work that you have done here and try to say something through that to people back in our own country.

"Sometimes the impression is given of everything being completely negative but what you have been doing here in these last few months has just been absolutely remarkable." He said they had carried on their vital work despite constant threats and mortar and rocket attacks. "You have done it and you have done it absolutely brilliantly.

"When I was up in Baghdad today, not just from the commanders of our own forces but from the commanders of the American forces and others that were there, they paid tribute to the British armed forces in a way that would have made you proud and made me very proud of you."