Pakistan clerics join fight against AIDS

PAKISTAN: Pakistani cleric Abdul Khaliq Faridi used to think HIV/AIDS was a mortal sin. But today, he educates thousands about a disease that is on the rise in the deeply conservative Muslim country.

He was among the first recruited into a government-backed project to raise awareness by harnessing the influence of clerics in Pakistani society and change the common perception that HIV/AIDS occurred as a result of depravity.

With hundreds of worshippers at his mosque, more than 1,000 pupils at his madrassa and hundreds of others he reaches as a visiting preacher, his is a receptive audience that few non-clerics can dream of in Pakistan.

"At first, most people were shy and some were even offended, but now they listen carefully. People have started thinking of AIDS as one of many deadly diseases instead of as a cardinal sin," Faridi told AFP.

He is the chief cleric at the Jamia Sattaria mosque and seminary in Karachi, Pakistan's largest city of 18 million which has probably the highest concentration of the country's more than 100,000 estimated HIV/AIDS sufferers.

"The Friday sermon is the greatest forum we have. People come to pray in huge numbers, thus educating them about AIDS on that platform is highly effective," said Faridi.

He is one of more than 2,500 religious leaders now engaged by the AIDS Control Programme, sponsored by the government of southern province Sindh, of which Karachi is the capital, to build awareness about HIV/AIDS.

AFP