NEW DELHI, Dec 7 (AFP) - Bhutan will encourage condom use among travelling civil servants and tour guides to prevent AIDS from spreading in the Buddhist kingdom which has reported just 43 cases of HIV infection, state media said.

The World Bank has pledged 5.5 million dollars and the government will put in another 1.4 million dollars in an awareness campaign about the disease, the Kuensel newspaper reported on its website.

Showing the need to change Bhutanese sexual behavior, Kuensel said 12 of the 43 HIV cases were civil servants who contracted the virus through sex even though such educated people "were generally believed to have some knowledge of the disease and the use of condoms."

The state-run newspaper also said that in the Himalayan kingdom's remote Laya area more than 20 children were fathered by visiting civil servants and tour guides who according to health officials "seldom asked for condoms."

Dorji Wangchuk, director of Bhutan's public health department, said the World Bank was expected to release its grant in July and that the awareness campaign would begin immediately afterwards.

Kuensel said Bhutan, which has a population of around two million, had 43 known cases of HIV infection, including eight people who died and that three more cases were expected to be confirmed by clinics.

The UN estimated last year about 100 Bhutanese were HIV-positive and said the first case was reported in the kingdom in 1993.

Despite its self-isolation, Bhutan has close political and commercial ties with India which officially has 4.58 million HIV-positive people, more than any country except South Africa with five million cases.

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