Prime Minister Tony Blair was involved in a rescue of a swimmer during his holiday in the Seychelles, it was revealed yesterday.
Mr Blair and his bodyguard helped to pull the swimmer - believed to be a Danish holiday-maker - out of the sea around a mile offshore after he got into difficulties with the current.
The man did not need to be revived after being pulled on to Mr Blair's dinghy and did not require hospital treatment, said local police.
It is understood that the tourist did not initially recognise Mr Blair and only realised he had been saved by a world leader after he had returned to shore.
Police spokesman Robert George, speaking from the Seychelles capital, Victoria, said: ''The incident occurred on Monday at around 2pm.
''A foreign holiday-maker was in difficulties with the current and Mr Blair, his bodyguard, and his skipper hauled him on board their dinghy.
Mr Blair told BBC News 24, when asked about the rescue: ''I don't think I can make any claims for myself at all. There was a guy in difficulty and we helped him, it was as simple as that.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article