Factbox: Highs and lows of former UK leader Tony Blair

(Reuters) - The memoirs of former British Prime Minister Tony Blair, 57, were published on Wednesday.

Proceeds from the book, "A Journey," are going to charity.

Here is a timeline on Blair since he became prime minister.

May 2, 1997 - Election victory sweeps Blair's Labour Party into power with massive majority of 179.

April 10, 1998 - Blair seals Northern Ireland Good Friday deal to bring an end to 30 years of violence in British province.

March 1999 - Blair sends troops to join NATO bombing campaign on Yugoslavia in a bid to halt suppression of ethnic Albanians.

June 13 - A collapse in Labour's core vote in elections for the European Parliament hands Blair his first electoral defeat.

June 8, 2001 - Blair wins second term, majority down to 167.

September - Blair pledges support to U.S. after September 11.

September 24, 2002 - Britain publishes dossier on Iraq that says Saddam could launch weapons of mass destruction in 45 minutes. Dossier is criticized for overplaying certainty of intelligence.

February 15, 2003 - Half a million people march in London to oppose war.

March 18 - Blair wins parliamentary vote over Iraq war but 139 party members defy him. Foreign minister Robin Cook resigns.

June 9 - Finance minister Gordon Brown rules out British adoption of the euro, dashing Blair hopes of placing Britain "at the heart of the European Union."

July 17 - British weapons expert David Kelly commits suicide after being identified as the source of a BBC story alleging the government had "sexed-up" intelligence on Iraq's banned weapons.

October 19 - Blair given electric shocks to regulate heart palpitations in the first health scare of his premiership.

January 28, 2004 - Inquiry by judge Lord Hutton into Kelly's death exonerates Blair's government of deliberately distorting intelligence to justify war. Weeks of public testimony raise questions about how Blair's acolytes acted in run-up to war.

October 1 - Blair in hospital to correct heart palpitations.

May 1, 2005 - Leaked documents say Bush and Blair were determined to topple Saddam Hussein months before the war.

May 5 - Blair wins third term, majority only 66.

March 2006 - Scotland Yard launches a probe into allegations political parties awarded state honors in return for loans.

December - Blair interviewed by police as witness in the corruption probe cash-for-honors row.

June 27, 2007 - Brown, finance minister since Labour came to power in 1997, takes over as prime minister from Tony Blair.

-- Blair becomes the big-power Middle East envoy with task of raising aid for the Palestinians, seeking to build their ruling institutions and promoting their economic development.

June 9, 2009 - Blair, who became a Roman Catholic in 2007 launches a "Face to Faith" initiative to get schoolchildren of different religions and countries talking to each other using video-conferencing.

October 20, 2009 - Blair is verbally attacked while visiting a mosque during an official trip to the West Bank city of Hebron.

January 29, 2010 - Blair appears at an inquiry into the Iraq war led by Lord Chilcot. He explains how the 9/11 attacks on the U.S. had changed "the calculus of risk" about Iraq. He defends his decision to go to war, saying Saddam had posed a threat to the world and had to be disarmed or removed.

August 16 - Blair says he will donate the proceeds from his memoirs to a project to help wounded soldiers funded by the Royal British Legion charity.

Sept 1 - Blair's memoirs, "The Journey" are published.