British Prime Minister Tony Blair said on Sunday that "tragedy" at Qana showed the situation in Lebanon "cannot continue," and called for an immediate UN resolution.

On Sunday, Israel attacked Qana village in southern Lebanon, killing at least 54 civilians, many of them children.

According to the Downing Street, Blair issued a statement saying that "this is an absolutely tragic situation, but we have got to make sure that the discussions we are having, and the negotiations that we are conducting do lead to a genuine cessation of hostilities in a way that allows us to put an end to them for good."

"The tragic events of today have underlined the urgency of the need for a ceasefire as soon as possible," said Blair, who was in San Francisco, the United States, after meeting with President George W. Bush last Friday for talks on an international force to enforce an eventual ceasefire in Lebanon.

"It is now necessary to work in New York on the preconditions for such a ceasefire which is a political agreement based on the full implementation of resolution 1559," Blair said.

U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, who returned to Israel on Saturday for her second tour of the Middle East in less than a week to broker an end to the Israel-Hezbollah conflict, cancelled a scheduled visit to Beirut on Sunday after the Israeli air raid on Qana, the deadliest single attack since the conflict began on July 12 following the capture of two Israeli soldiers by Hezbollah guerrillas.

Source: Xinhua