CAPE TOWN, Feb 15 (AFP) - South African Defence Minister Mosiuoa Lekota Tuesday said the HIV/AIDS rate in the army was between 17 and 23 percent, according to a sample of blood tests from volunteers and those who had served on missions abroad.

"We have remained generally contented to say that only out of that sample something in the region of 17, 22 to 23 percent, that is what was taken from that sample," Lekota told reporters about the survey undertaken two years ago.

In July 2002, Lekota had said that not more than 23 percent of the estimated 70,000-strong defence force -- or one in four -- had HIV/AIDS; a steep rise from a 1999 estimate which put the figure at 17 percent.

The defence force estimates of the HIV/AIDS rate are based on voluntary testing and mandatory tests on soldiers who go on missions overseas.

"We encourage members of the defence force to report and go for voluntary testing ... we still can't compel people once they become part of the army," Lekota said.

"When it comes to missions abroad, it is unavoidable, we have to test them for everything including HIV/AIDS, we can't send people with illness that might affect people abroad whether its yellow fever, cholera, or even HIV," he added.

"It is not just HIV and AIDS that can prevent a person from being taken into the national defence force, somebody with haemophilia, what are you going to do, you have no cure for it, you have to say sorry, you can't get in.

South Africa is one of the countries with highest HIV/AIDS rates in the world, affecting about 5.3 million people.

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