Tony Blair will today come under intense international pressure from 130 campaign groups and charities to reverse his decision to scrap a corruption inquiry into a Saudi arms deal.

Lobby groups including Amnesty International, Ox-fam, Friends of the Earth and Transparency International have written to the prime minister and other ministers in an effort to have the Serious Fraud Office inquiry into the al-Yamamah deal between BAE Systems and the Saudi government reopened.