Former chief UN weapons inspector Hans Blix said Wednesday the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq had failed tragically in its aim of making the world a safer place and succeeded only in stimulating terrorism.

Blix, in implicit criticism of the main protagonists President Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair, said the action had also failed to deter any ambitions on the part of Iran or North Korea to develop nuclear weapons.

"The acknowledged gain of the war was that a treacherous and murderous dictator (Saddam Hussein was removed, but the rest has been tragedy and failure," he told Reuters in an interview. "It has stimulated terrorism."

Many critics of the invasion argue it opened Iraq to Islamist militants involved in an insurrection against coalition forces, while distracting attention from a campaign against the al-Qaeda group blamed for September, 2001 attacks on the United States.

"Is the world safer? No. It's not safer in Iraq," he said in his native Stockholm. "If North Korea and Iran are contemplating going for weapons of mass destruction, then it hasn't stopped them. It has not solved the Middle East conflict."

Blix suggested Washington and London had lost perspective in focusing on Saddam who, it has since emerged, was not involved in developing nuclear arms.

"Of course they were concerned with North Korea and Iran. But...they focused a great deal of their efforts on Iraq while other things were left simmering."

Iran denies U.S. accusations it is developing nuclear arms. Experts say North Korea has an arsenal of between two and nine nuclear bombs.

Blix, who retired from the UN last year and now chairs a Swedish-sponsored Weapons of Mass Destruction Commission, also cast doubt on the Iraqi government's comments Tuesday that UN weapons inspectors were welcome to return.

"The Iraqi government would need to offer guarantees of safety," said the 75-year-old former head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, who led the UN inspections team until 2003. "But to go to sites which satellites have already found to be empty is perhaps not meaningful."

Iraqi Science and Technology Minister Rashad Omar issued the invitation after an IAEA report Monday said neither Baghdad nor Washington appeared to have noticed the disappearance of nuclear equipment and materials once closely monitored by IAEA.

Source: Agencies