United Nations weapons inspectors should have the time they need to do their job in Iraq, but it should not take them months to determine whether Saddam Hussein is cooperating fully, Prime Minister Tony Blair  said Sunday. Blair also said he would be "very focused" on securing formal U.N. backing for military action against Saddam if force becomes necessary.

Interviewed on the British Broadcasting Corp.'s "Breakfast with Frost" program, he emphasized that Saddam has a responsibility not just to give inspectors access to sites they ask to see, but to tell them exactly what weapons of mass destruction he has.

"I have always said the inspectors should have the time to do their job," he told the BBC. "But what is important is that their job is not to repeat what happened in the 1990s."

Asked whether they should have weeks or months, he replied "Well, I don't believe it will take them months to find out whether he is cooperating or not, but they should have whatever time they need."

The prime minister downplayed the significance of the report inspectors are to deliver to the Security Council Monday, saying it was "just the first full report, there'll be other reports."

He said that if the weapons inspectors eventually determine Iraq is in breach of the United Nations resolution demanding it disarm, Britain believed it was very important to secure a second resolution authorizing the use of force.

"There is only one set of circumstances in which I've said we'd move without one," he said. "That is the circumstance where the U.N. inspectors say he's not cooperating and he's in breach of the resolution ... but the U.N., because someone, say, unreasonably uses their veto, blocks a resolution."

"I don't believe that will happen," he continued, saying it was crucial that the world body enforce its demands that the Iraqi leader disarm.

Failing to do so, he argued, would dangerously weaken the United Nations' credibility.

"If we face an issue where ... the United Nations comes to a position and says 'You've got to disarm yourself of those weapons,' and then the U.N. does nothing about the failure to disarm, well, how when we deal with North Korea  are we going to get them to treat us seriously?" he asked.

"How when we take these issues out to other countries that are developing potentially nuclear capability, are they going to take the international community seriously, when faced with the challenge with Iraq we've done nothing?"

Struggling to win over a British public skeptical about war, Blair sought again to make his case for confronting Saddam, arguing that Iraq's weapons of mass destruction pose a serious threat.

"Unless we take a stand ... it is only a matter of time before international terrorism and these types of weapons come together," he said.

While polls show a majority of the British public opposed to war against Iraq, Blair said that sentiment could change as events develop.

If inspectors discover evidence of banned weapons or the United Nations authorizes military action, Blair said, then "public opinion's in a different place."

Blair also rejected suggestions that Britain's strong backing of American policy made it a tempting target for terrorists. He pointed out that would-be terrorists have also been arrested in France, which has been less supportive of President Bush's Iraq strategy.

"We're not going to avoid this by hiding away, and it's not what the British do anyway," he said. "I mean, there's a struggle on and we've got to be there, and we would have no influence in shaping it unless we were there."

"When America is taking on these tough ... questions, our job is to be there ... in the difficult and tricky times, not simply there as fair weather friends."


PHOTO CAPTION

A demonstrator talks on a cellphone next to a banner reading 'Bush + Blair + Sharon - the Hitlers of these days' during the demonstration against the annual meeting of the World Economic Forum  WEF, in Davos, Switzerland, Saturday, Jan. 25, 2003. The WEF takes place in Davos until Tuesday, Jan. 28. (AP Photo/Keystone, Eddy Risc