LONDON, July 15 (AFP) - British Prime Minister Tony Blair was Thursday hoping to escape embarrassing defeats in two key by-elections amid fears among his ruling Labour Party that the once invulnerable leader is losing his popular appeal.
The by-elections in traditionally safe Labour strongholds of Leicester and Birmingham come just a day after an official report found that the government took the country into a deeply unpopular war in Iraq on the basis of flawed intelligence.
Many believe Blair got off lightly as the five-month investigation shot holes in the primary justification for the war -- intelligence that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction -- but stopped short of blaming the government.
Despite finding that Britain joined the US-led war in March 2003 based on evidence that was at times "seriously flawed" and "unreliable", inquiry head Lord Robin Butler said Blair had not deliberately misled the nation.
But that left many in Britain still wondering who was to blame, and prompted Labour fears that the report coupled with a weight of domestic issues could swing the balance against the party in Thursday's ballots.
To lose one -- or worse, both -- seats would prompt deep shiftings of unease within a Labour Party increasingly worried that the once invulnerable Blair is now proving a turn-off for voters.
That in turn would ratchet up recent speculation that Blair's respected finance minister -- and arch-rival -- Gordon Brown could be considering an internal coup to oust the prime minister.
Blair, whose uncanny ability to wiggle out of many a tight hole has earned him the moniker "Teflon Tony," has seen his popularity plummet in recent months, culminating in July's disastrous showings at local and European polls.
Labour easily retained the Leicester South and Birmingham Hodge Hill constituencies at the last general election in 2001 but the death of one MP and the retirement of another left Blair facing a deeply unwelcome test of popularity on Thursday.
The Labour leadership will scrutinise the results of the by-elections, expected around 2:00 am (0100 GMT) on Friday, for any evidence as to whether the Iraq issue is impacting on the party's electoral prospects.
Pollsters have decreed both by-elections, the results of which will be declared in the early hours of Friday, too close to call, with the candidates battling it out over a range of local and national issues.
Some pundits said Iraq could prove Blair's undoing in Leicester and Birmingham. Both have a high proportion of South Asian-origin Muslim, Hindu and Sikh voters, many of whom bitterly opposed the conflict.
In September, a formerly ultra-safe Labour seat in London fell to the anti-Iraq war Liberal Democrats and that party is scenting blood again.
But John Benyon, professor of politics at the University of Leicester, said the Iraq effect might have been overplayed.
"On the doorstep in Leicester South, we have found that the Iraq war does not seem to be a big issue and the Butler report is likely to make this less of an issue," he said.
Butler's findings had been "as good as the government could have hoped for", Benyon added.
"Basically it largely seems to exonerate the prime minister and his colleagues of any charge of operating in bad faith. The sort of criticisms that have been made, that the prime minister misled the press and the public, are not supported by the document."
In 2001, Labour won the Birmingham Hodge Hill constituency with a majority of 11,618. It won Leicester South by 13,243 votes.
Opposition Conservative leader Michael Howard on Thursday challenged Blair to debate the Butler report with him next week in an already scheduled parliamentary debate on Iraq.
"It would give MPs the opportunity to debate your failure to give the country an accurate account of the intelligence you had received on weapons of mass destruction -- errors for which, you said yesterday, you 'accept full personal responsibility'," Howard wrote in a letter to Blair.
The offer was rejected and Foreign Secretary Jack Straw is expected to lead the debate for Labour.