BBC World Service | Programmes | World Today | Tony Blair

No more guessing. The British Prime Minister Tony Blair will step down in seven weeks' time. To announce his decision Mr Blair went back to his political birthplace and a meeting of loyal supporters in his constituency of Sedgefield, in north east England.

I've come back here to Sedgefield where my political journey began and where it's fitting it should end. Today I announce my decision to stand down from the leadership of the Labour party. The party will now select a new leader.

Tony Blair.

Ten years after the landslide victory that brought him to power. Mr Blair said a decade was long enough for him and also perhaps for the country. People from around the UK had mixed reactions.

It seems that for much of the Biritsh population Mr Blair's international legacy overshadows his actions at home.

But how did Tony Blair come to cut such a figure on the world stage in the first place? Why did a labour prime minister whose priorities back in 1997 were famously education education and more education, turn into someone for whom foreign policy, and foreign wars in particular, would become so important?

The BBC's foreign affairs specialist, Allan Little, has been examining why Tony Blair went to war quite so often during his decade in power.

But what do international politicians think of his ten year performance on the world stage? Here are the thoughts of leaders from the US, the EU, the middle east, Iraq and Afghanistan.

I'll miss Tony Blair. He is a political figure who is capable of thinking over the horizon. He's a long term thinker. I have found him to be a man who has kept his word which sometimes is rare in the political circles I run in.

George W. Bush.

In Africa he won many friends. Mr Blair called poverty, disease, conflict and trade injustice in African countries a 'scar on the world's conscience' and sent British troops into the West African country of Sierra Leone in 2000 to help defeat rebel forces.

President John Kufour of Ghana is chairman of the African Union and as he told The World Today, he's a fan of Mr Blair.

Zimbabwe is yet to be resolved. It's a bilateral problem between Britain and Zimbabwe. The Zimbabwean government keeps on accusing the British government for not keeping its word in terms of payment of compensation. I would have wished the British government had paid the compensation direct to the Zimbabwean government.

President Kufour of Ghana.

Among the leaders who have been reflecting on Tony Blair, Ahmed Tejjan Kaba, the persident og Sierra Leone, has more cause than most to be grateful. In 2000 Mr Blair deployed British troops to that country. They brought an end to 10 years of civil war and stabilised the country's political institutions.

Some consider it was this success that first gave Tony Blair a taste for foreign interventions.

Tony Blair responded promptly, not only militarily, but also in the areas of development and reconstruction and rebuilding of democratic institutions which are now taking shape in our country.

Ahmed Tejjan Kaba.

And it was Africa that became one of Tony Blair's biggest concerns during his premiership. Two years ago when Britain held the rotating presidency of the Group of 8 industrialised nations, as well as the presidency of the European Union, Mr Blair made sure that the reduction of poverty in Africa was top of the international agenda.

But what did he actually achieve? Our Southern Africa correspondent, Peter Biles, reports.

This will be the most stage-managed departure that there's ever been from one of the most stage-managed governments there's ever been.

British impersonator, Rory Bremner.

Obviously Tony Blair's departure affects relations with other world leaders and the people he governed for a decade, but for the cartoonists and impressionists of the world, it will mean a dramataic change in their ability to earn a living.

The World Today called British satirist Rory Bremner to find out what he made of the momentous news: