Boy scout saves Maldives president from assassination bid: official

0 Comments | AFP, January, 2008

COLOMBO (AFP) — The president of the Maldives, Maumoon Abdul Gayoom, escaped an assassination attempt Tuesday while on a tour of the Indian Ocean archipelago, a senior minister told AFP.

Officials said a 20-year-old unemployed man tried to plunge a knife into Gayoom's stomach, but that Asia's longest serving president was unhurt thanks to a boy scout who wrestled with the attacker before he was detained.

"The president was greeting people when a young boy pulled out a knife and tried to stab him in the stomach," Information Minister Mohamed Nasheed said by telephone from the island capital of Male.

The attack took place on Hoarafushi in the north of the Maldives, a chain of 1,192 coral and white sand islands off the southern tip of India.

The...