SEOUL, Dec 1, 2006 (AFP) - North Korea claimed on Friday on World AIDS Day that it has no cases of the incurable disease, attributing the absence to the wise guidance of the Stalinist state's leader Kim Jong-Il.
Minju Joson, the government's official daily, said the North had established orderly systems across the country for spreading information about AIDS, and carrying out surveillance and tests.
"Under the wise guidance of leader Kim Jong Il, the DPRK (North Korea) established the strategy of prevention and control of AIDS with orderly systems of information, prognosis and monitoring, and examination across the country," the daily said.
"On this basis, measures have been taken not to allow a single AIDS case," it was quoted by Pyongyang's official Korean Central News Agency as saying in an article marking World AIDS Day.
Pyongyang made the claim as health authorities in Seoul said new infections in South Korea had risen 13 percent from a year earlier.
Since 1985, when the first AIDS case was detected in South Korea, a total 4,401 people have contracted the HIV virus of whom 806 have died, they said.
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