Tony Blair, Britain's former Prime Minister and current Special Envoy to the Middle East, has described the uprising in Iran as "exciting" but cautioned against Western intervention in the turmoil.

Speaking at the 92Y club in Manhattan last night, Mr Blair said that it was impossible to predict the outcome of protests in Iran over the landslide presidential election victory claimed by the incumbent, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

Riot police continued a crackdown on demonstrators in Tehran last night after a week in which at least 17 protesters have died.

Mr Blair called the uprising an "extraordinary and exciting moment". "It shows that there are a large number of particularly young people that want change," he said.

The former Prime Minister, who was chosen in 2007 by the US, Russia, the European Union and the United Nations to be the quartet's representative in negotiations between Israel and the Palestians, said that he was in the Middle East on Sunday night and left in no doubt that the region was monitoring the Iran situation intently.

The fall of President Ahmadinejad's Government would assist the peace talks, Mr Blair said, because Iran currently funded Hamas's attacks on Israel, while unsettling Israel with threats to "wipe it off the map".

"If you start to take that destabilising factor out of the region, of course it'll have an impact," he said.

However, he cautioned against medddling in Iran's political process, in line with the response of President Obama who has so far refused to call for a regime change in Iran.

"It's difficult because you want to stand up for people you sympathise with but President Obama is right, you've got to be careful because your intervention could be used against the people protesting," Mr Blair said.

"[We can help] by focusing on it, by letting people know that the world is watching and is, in many senses, in solidarity with the people there."

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