Tony Blair: West needs to have 'correct strategy' in place to beat Islamist extremism - before things 'intensify'

Former PM also recounts the day of the 7/7 bombings and the challenges he, and the Labour party, faced

( Ian Forsyth/Getty Images)

The West will not tackle the growing threat of Islamist extremism unless it has the correct strategy in place, former Prime Minister, Tony Blair, has warned.

As Britain commemorates the ten-year anniversary of the 7/7 bombings today, Mr Blair – who was in power at the time of the attacks – hinted that the UK needs to do more in the ‘ground battle’ against Isis before it intensifies “in time to come.”

In an interview with the BBC, Mr Blair said he doesn’t criticise Western leadership but did acknowledge the “long, hard struggle” and added: “We’ve got to be prepared to engage over a long period of time because, at the time of 7/7, we faced people who had been radicalised over a period of time.”

However, today, he said, Britons are facing a situation where fighters coming back from Syria “are our own citizens.”

He added: “You have training camps, actually, in Libya – not just in Syria – in Iraq and elsewhere and this threat is not going away.”

Making reference to the recent attacks in Tunisia, he said: “This is a global problem and the only way of dealing with it is for people to come together whatever their faith background and say we are united against this terrorism.”

In a candid recount, Mr Blair recalled the day London came under attack in the worst terrorist atrocity in its recent history – when 52 people lost their lives across the city – and how his biggest challenge was to strike a balance between public safety and shutting down London altogether.

Whilst hosting the G8 summit in Gleneagles, Mr Blair was handed a note after the attacks began.

He said: “At the time, it wasn’t quite clear exactly what it was.

“As the day progressed, it became obvious that this was a severe set of terrorist attacks.

“For the next few weeks, we were in constant anxiety as to, each time a warning came about, whether we should shut down the Underground.

“But then we came to a point where I decided we wouldn’t just keep on doing this.”