‘Don’t kill us with diplomacy’ person with HIV tells UN AIDS meeting – Annan

Following a meeting with persons living with HIV who are attending a major United Nations meeting on AIDS in New York, Secretary-General Kofi Annan reported their appeal to diplomats not to negotiate away past gains in a declaration to be adopted by the end of the three-day session, which concludes Friday.

“We had a very good conversation with people living with HIV/AIDS who have been attending this conference and had great concerns about the quality of the document that may come out of the conference,” Mr. Annan told the press following a meeting with some 45 people living with HIV.

“They were concerned that we may be rolling back the gains which were made” at the General Assembly special session on the issue in 2001 “and they appealed to the delegates to ensure that they improve on the document and not roll it back, and above all, do no harm.”

The Secretary-General said he was struck by the advocacy of the people with HIV, including one who appealed to delegates not to negotiate away past gains. “One of them pleaded ‘please don’t kill us with diplomacy, come up with real proposals that will help us on the ground,’” Mr. Annan said.

Dr. Peter Piot, Executive Director of the Joint UN Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS), repeated this call. “As the Secretary-General has said, we will not forgive that ‘death by diplomacy.’ So, we’re looking forward to the end of the negotiations. We have a new draft, which is much stronger, and tomorrow we will have the high-level session that should endorse, hopefully, a strong declaration.”

Cannon Gideon from Uganda, from the African Network of Religious Leaders living with HIV, stressed the need for clear language in the final document. “We are really concerned that if we don’t have a specific target on defeating stigma and discrimination, then we may not achieve our targets on universal access,” he said. “This is very, very, very important that we have targets, we have outcomes, we have shared responsibility to ensure that stigma and discrimination and denial is defeated, so that we can have everyone accessing treatment, accessing prevention services and information.”

Rolake Nwagwu of Nigeria said his continent was not leading the charge for progress. “As an African and living with HIV in this meeting, what we have seen so far is that we are thoroughly embarrassed at the African position.”

On a more positive note, Dr. Piot saw progress in the very presence of people living with HIV at the conference. “This is a big difference with 2001 when there were hardly any people living with HIV being members of delegations in the General Assembly,” he said, adding, “That is I think an illustration that there is really a change of mind.”