Politicians said the BBC's admission called its whole report into question, and Blair said he was pleased it had confirmed Kelly's role as the source. "Whatever the differences, no one wanted this tragedy to happen," he said in a statement.
Speaking in Asia, a defensive Blair also rejected suggestions he should curtail his trip or recall parliament from its summer break to debate what drove Kelly, 59, to slit his wrist in woodland near his Oxfordshire home on Thursday.
Two days before, Kelly was grilled in parliament over his role as a Ministry of Defence source who spoke to the author of a BBC story that Blair's communications chief Alastair Campbell "sexed up" a September dossier on Saddam Hussein's weapons.
The BBC allegation that Campbell exaggerated intelligence to indicate Saddam could mobilise weapons of mass destruction in 45 minutes is at the centre of claims Blair misled the British public and parliament over the case for war.
Kelly's death has left Blair, 50, facing the biggest political crisis of his six-year rule and turned a week-long foreign trip into a nightmare.
After a rapturous reception in the United States for his support on Iraq, Blair heard the news about Kelly on the plane to Japan and has looked ashen-faced ever since.
In the unseemly recriminations over Kelly's death, critics of the government say it put him under intolerable pressure by face the limelight in an effort to discredit the BBC report and therefore clear Campbell and Blair.
But the BBC, which had until Sunday refused to confirm whether or not Kelly was its source, is charged with heightening the media frenzy around him. His position also did not fit the BBC's description of him as a senior intelligence source.
Kelly's local member of parliament, Robert Jackson, said BBC Chairman Gavyn Davies and Director General Greg Dyke should quit. "If they had made this statement while Dr Kelly was alive, I believe he would still be alive," he said.
In its statement on Sunday, the BBC said it "believes we accurately interpreted and reported" information from Kelly.
That backing of its journalist Andrew Gilligan was at odds with Kelly's own comments to a parliamentary committee that he did not provide the crucial 45-minute claim in the BBC report.
If Kelly was the source but did not make that claim, it would strengthen the Blair government's accusation that Gilligan hyped his report. He and Campbell have a long-running enmity.
Ignoring calls to resign from radical members of his own ruling Labour Party, Blair urged people to wait for the results of a judicial inquiry and said he would accept responsibility if there was any wrongdoing by members of his administration.
Beyond the debate, Kelly's family echoed a sentiment of disgust among many Britons with the whole "Westminster Village" world of British media and politics.
"Events over recent weeks have made David's life intolerable and all of those involved should reflect long and hard over that fact," they said.
- REUTERS
Death of a civil servant, a casualty of war
British Parliament Foreign Affairs Committee transcript:
Evidence of Dr David Kelly
Key players in the 'sexed-up dossier' affair
Herald Feature: Iraq
Iraq links and resources
