LONDON, April 28 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) - Washington’s all-time ally British Prime Minister Tony Blair warned Monday, April 28, that any attempt by Europe to act as a rival polar power to the United States would be "dangerous and destabilizing" for the world.

"I don't want Europe setting itself up in opposition to America... I think it will be dangerous and destabilizing," Blair told the business daily the Financial Times.

"Those people who fear 'unilateralism' -- so-called and in inverted commas -- in America should realize that the quickest way to get that is to set up a rival polar power to America."

Blair dismissed talks that French President Jacques Chirac should be "punished" for opposing the U.S.-led war.

"I am not really interested in talk about punishing countries, but I think there is an issue that we have to resolve here between America and Europe and within Europe about Europe's attitude towards the transatlantic alliance."

"I don't want to see a situation develop in which either Europe or America sees a huge strategic interest at stake and we are not helping each other.

"And I think there is a difference of vision. Some want a so-called multi-polar world where you have different centers of power, and I believe will quickly develop into rival centers of power; and others believe, and this is my notion, that we need one polar power which encompasses a strategic partnership between Europe and America."

But the Financial Times said "Blair has issued a direct challenge to Chirac over the future of the transatlantic relationship by warning that the French president's vision of Europe as a rival of the U.S. is dangerously destabilizing.".

On whether he was still convinced that Iraq possesses weapons of mass destruction, Blair replied: "Yes I am and I don't think it in the least surprising that it is going to take some time before we assemble the evidence."

Taking up the North Korean nuclear crisis, Blair said it should be resolved diplomatically.

"It is not just the U.S. and Britain that regard a nuclear capability in the hands of North Korea as a threat," Blair said.

"China and South Korea would say the same. The question is how you deal with it. And again I think we have got to offer North Korea a way out of its present situation."