Teenage Boy Scout a Hero in the Maldives

That the attacker may have been an Islamic extremist is only adding to the tale of the 15-year-old's bravery, even as it threatens the Maldives' reputation as a peaceful tropical paradise for well-heeled foreigners.

"The Scouts saying is 'Be prepared'," Mohammed Jaisham Ibrahim told The Associated Press in an interview Thursday. "I was prepared."

The lanky teenager smiles as he says it he's clearly been practicing the line in the two days since the attack turned him into a big deal in this small country of nearly 1,200 islands that stretch south from India.

Officials have so far played down the Islamic extremism angle in the attack, saying Tuesday's attempted assassination of President Maumoon Gayoom may have been politically motivated but offering no other details.

Police arrested the alleged assailant and on Wednesday picked up four suspected accomplices.

Ibrahim said he had no doubt the alleged attacker was a militant or inspired by an extremist vision of the world, a view seconded by people who know the suspect.

"He had a long beard; he shouted 'God is Great' when he took out his knife. He kept shouting it," Ibrahim said from the hospital in Male where he is recovering from wounds to his left hand sustained in the attack.

Wearing his khaki Maldives scout uniform with a blue kerchief, Ibrahim and the 20 other members of his Boy Scout troop were among scores of people who turned out Tuesday to greet Gayoom when he arrived on Hoarafushi, a remote island that is home to about 2,800 people.

Ibrahim said the attacker was behind him, jostling to get closer to the president.