Shares in Merlin fell 3.5 percent on news that four people were seriously hurt at one of Britain's biggest theme parks, run by the firm, when two carriages collided on a rollercoaster ride.

Merlin was the biggest loser on the FTSE 100 index, which fell 0.4 percent to 6,928.27 points.

Tobacco shares slipped, with British American Tobacco (BAT) dropping 2.4 percent after a Canadian court awarded more than C$15 billion ($12 billion) in damages to smokers in class-action cases. A BAT subsidiary was among three companies that said they would appeal.

Peer Imperial Tobacco slid 2.9 percent.

"The wider implications of the legal battle are more significant than the billions of dollars in damages awarded to the plaintiffs in this particular instance," Laith Khalaf, senior analyst at Hargreaves Lansdown, said.

"If this genie gets out of the bottle, it will set a precedent for court cases across the globe against the tobacco industry. The tobacco firms involved are therefore likely to throw the kitchen sink at defending their case."

Elsewhere trading stayed cautious. The FTSE 100 index is still up about 5 percent this year, but has traded in a tight 350-point range since the beginning of February.

Traders noted persistent uncertainty about the situation in Greece, whose Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras said the country had sent creditors a comprehensive and realistic package of reforms for consideration and was calling on Europe's leaders to accept it so a long-awaited deal can be struck.

The heads of Germany, France and Greece's international creditor institutions agreed late on Monday to work with intensity in coming days as they try to clinch a deal in debt negotiations with Athens.

"Europe is still a big unknown. It's keeping the markets on edge, and we're playing a range, because no-one wants to commit their money long term when no one knows what the outcome over Greece is," ETX Capital sales trader, Mark Priest, said.

The concern is that any Greek debt default and exit from the euro would raise fresh uncertainties about the euro zone as a whole and could damage Europe's growth prospects.

On the upside, miners tracked a recovery in key industrial metals prices. The UK mining index rose 2.2 percent, boosted by a 1.8 to 3.2 percent rise in shares of Rio Tinto, Antofagasta and BHP Billiton.

Anglo American jumped 4.5 percent, also after saying its iron ore sales to India had more than tripled over the past year.

Plumbing supplies group Wolseley rose 2 percent after posting a 12.4 percent rise in quarterly revenue.

(Additional reporting by Liisa Tuhkanen; Editing by David Holmes and Susan Fenton)

By Atul Prakash