Mr Ahmadinejad urged the participants - including ultra-Orthodox Jews who say the creation of Israel was an abomination - to examine Holocaust in more detail.

“Iran is your home and is the home of all freedom seekers of the world. Here you can express your views and exchange opinions in a friendly, brotherly and free atmosphere,” he said.

Iran, which is home to 25,000 Jews, says 67 researchers from 30 countries attended the meeting.

Mr Blair said: “The principal reason we are having a problem in Iraq is because people are deliberately giving us a problem.

“There’s sometimes a sense in which, it’s as if, if only we sort of had a different post-conflict strategy, somehow we could have avoided this problem.