British Prime Minister Tony Blair has suffered a huge damage to his reputation among voters as a direct result of the death of weapons expert David Kelly, and the government's bitter dispute with the BBC, according to a poll issued Monday.

The row has also inflicted damage on the BBC after it admitted Sunday that the scientist had been the main source for its report that the government had "sexed up" a dossier on Iraq's weapons of mass destruction.

The YouGov survey for the Daily Telegraph newspaper, conducted after Kelly's death had been confirmed, found that almost as many voters believe Blair should resign (39 percent) as think he should stay on as the country's prime minister (41 percent).

Equally damaging for Blair is that 59 percent of voters said their opinion of him had gone down since the Kelly affair.

Sixty-five percent said they believed that Alastair Campbell, the Downing Street director of communications, should resign. Campbell is directly alleged to have "doctorated" the dossier claiming ousted Iraqi President Saddam Hussein could deploy banned weapons within 45 minutes.

While three times as many voters said they trusted the BBC than had faith in the government, the BBC was also struggling last night to maintain its credibility.

There was fevered speculation in Whitehall over who was responsible for the leaking of Dr Kelly's name to the press, according to the newspaper.

The Ministry of Defense's chief press officer, who confirmed Kelly's name to three newspapers, said it would not make further comment until the judicial inquiry.

The 59-year-old weapons expert, who was found dead on Friday with his wrist slit, had suggested last week that he was not the source of BBC's disputed report.

(Xinhua News Agency July 22, 2003)