Tributes have poured in for former British foreign secretary Robin Cook, who died yesterday after collapsing on a Scottish mountainside.
Mr Cook (59) was with his wife Gaynor on Ben Stack in Sutherland when he took ill at 2.23pm, Northern Constabulary said.
The Labour MP, who lived in Edinburgh, was near the summit of the 2,365ft mountain.
He was airlifted by a Coastguard helicopter to Raigmore Hospital in Inverness, where he died.
Mr Cook was a keen hill-walker, and regularly spends his summer holidays with close family and friends enjoying the dramatic mountain scenery of Highland Scotland, rather than going abroad.
British prime minister Tony Blair praised Mr Cook as an intellectual and political heavyweight despite their clash over the decision to back the United States in Iraq in 2003, when Cook quit government over the issue
"This news will be received with immense sadness, not just in Britain but in many parts of the world," Mr Blair said. "Robin was an outstanding, extraordinary talent - brilliant, incisive in debate, of incredible skill and persuasive power."
Cook took over as foreign secretary in 1997 pledging a new "ethical dimension" to foreign policy. But his first year in office was marked by personal embarrassment and questions over his judgment.
He abruptly ended his 28-year marriage to first wife Margaret when a newspaper threatened to reveal he was having an affair with his secretary Gaynor Regan, whom he later married.
He survived the scandal to play a prominent role in NATO's 1999 campaign to force Serbian troops out of Kosovo. He later listed "defending Kosovo" as one of his greatest achievements.
UN Secretary General Kofi Annan paid tribute to the former foreign secretary as a "partner on a wide range of issues".
"Throughout a rich and varied life, Mr Cook displayed exceptional intellect, eloquence, vision and passion in the domestic and international arenas alike," a spokesman for Annan said.
British defence secretary John Reid said he was shocked and deeply saddened by Cook's death.
"Robin's loss will extend far beyond his own family. Parliament has lost one of its finest performers, the Labour Party one of its best minds and the international community one of its strongest advocates and participants," he added.
British Muslim leaders praised Cook's opposition to the Iraq war and human rights activists lauded his commitment to international justice and control of the arms trade.
"He helped expose the need for more stringent controls on an arms trade that all too often leads to weapons ending up in the hands of tyrants and human rights abusers," said Mike Blakemore, media director of Amnesty International.
The Irish Labour Party's president, Michael D. Higgins TD, paid tribute to Mr Cook, describing his death as a "great loss" to the international Labour movement.
"Robin Cook was also a politician of great principle with a real vision of society and the world," he said. "An internationalist in the best sense of that word, he displayed exceptional strength of character when he resigned as a government minister over his opposition to the war in Iraq."