LONDON, Feb 10: British Prime Minister Tony Blair has agreed to meet Libyan President Moamer Qadhafi after talks here on Tuesday indicated the former pariah state was aiming to return to the international fold after decades in the diplomatic wilderness.

"We're hoping very much that a visit can be arranged as soon as convenient but no date has yet been fixed," British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw said, when asked whether Mr Blair had been invited to Libya in a letter from Mr Qadhafi handed over by Libyan Foreign Minister Abdel Rahman Shalgam.

A foreign office spokeswoman said later it had not yet been decided whether the two leaders would meet in Libya or another country. Mr Straw was addressing a joint press conference in the Foreign Office alongside Mr Shalgam, who earlier met Mr Blair privately at Downing Street and handed him the personal letter from Mr Qadhafi.

Mr Shalgam's landmark two-day trip to London coincided with a brief stay in Libya by Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi. Mr Berlusconi became the first western leader to visit the oil-rich state and meet Mr Qadhafi since he announced in December that Tripoli had given up the search to obtain weapons of mass destruction, following months of secret talks with Britain and the United States.

Mr Shalgam's stay in London was described as "historic" by Jack Straw, who noted that it was the first by a Libyan foreign minister to Britain "in over 20 years".

The visit "is tangible proof of the improved relations between Libya and the UK", Mr Straw said. Ties between the nations were shattered in 1984 when a British policewoman was shot dead from inside the Libyan embassy in London as she monitored an anti-Libyan demonstration in the street outside.

Four years later a US airliner was downed by a bomb over the Scottish town of Lockerbie, killing 270 people. Libya eventually accepted responsibility and agreed to pay 2.7 billion dollars in compensation to families of the victims, but only after years of United Nations sanctions. -AFP