African Nations Attending Regional AIDS Conference Agree to Implement ‘Detailed’ Plans of Action

Nearly 100 delegates from 14 Central and East African countries attending an AIDS conference at the U.N. Economic Commission for Africa, in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, on Friday agreed to draft "detailed" national action plans to tackle HIV/AIDS and "boost regional contacts," Agence France-Presse reports. Each nation that sent representatives to the conference will develop an action plan indicating how it will combat HIV/AIDS over a period of two to 12 months. According to Yene Assegid, coordinator of the Central and Eastern Africa Sub-Regional Resource Facility of the U.N. Development Program, experts will organize a "virtual regional team for exchanging information and expertise notably over the Internet and dra[w] a large number of people into effective participation in the struggle against the pandemic." The countries --Burundi, Cameroon, the Central African Republic, Chad, the Republic of Congo, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Gabon, Kenya, Rwanda, Sao Tome and Principe and Uganda -- will strive for "less paperwork [and] more regional contact," according to UNDP representative Ravi Prodom (Agence France-Presse, 9/7).