04-22-2005, 10:24 PM
<b>'More jawans killed by AIDS than bullets' </b>
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->"The time has come to wake up with HIV infection among our troops assuming serious dimensions. Now we find more soldiers dying to HIV-AIDS than to bullets fired by militants," Lieutenant General Bhopinder Singh, Director General of Assam Rifles, said in Shillong.
"We have a challenge at hand and we need to tackle it sensitively," he told AFP at the force headquarters.
The Assam Rifles is a premier paramilitary force of 55,000 troops deployed in the rugged jungles of the northeast against some 30 guerrilla groups waging insurgencies for independent homelands or greater autonomy.
The first HIV-positive Assam Rifles soldier was detected in 1992. Since then, 32 Assam Rifles soldiers have died of AIDS and 180 more are in serious condition at two treatment camps in the region
<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->The northeast has been declared as one of the country's high-risk zones with close to 100,000 people infected with HIV<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->"The time has come to wake up with HIV infection among our troops assuming serious dimensions. Now we find more soldiers dying to HIV-AIDS than to bullets fired by militants," Lieutenant General Bhopinder Singh, Director General of Assam Rifles, said in Shillong.
"We have a challenge at hand and we need to tackle it sensitively," he told AFP at the force headquarters.
The Assam Rifles is a premier paramilitary force of 55,000 troops deployed in the rugged jungles of the northeast against some 30 guerrilla groups waging insurgencies for independent homelands or greater autonomy.
The first HIV-positive Assam Rifles soldier was detected in 1992. Since then, 32 Assam Rifles soldiers have died of AIDS and 180 more are in serious condition at two treatment camps in the region
<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->The northeast has been declared as one of the country's high-risk zones with close to 100,000 people infected with HIV<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->