Praful Patel, WB vice-president for South Asia, said girls' education was a powerful weapon to check the spread of Human Immuno Virus (HIV) and the Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (Aids) in Bangladesh, where 54 percent students in primary schools are female.

"Educated girls are aware of what happens to their bodies, they are capable of negotiations with their partners, and they know how to protect themselves," Patel told the news agency at the Impact Convention Centre where the 15th International Aids Conference is going on.

The 15th Aids conference is jointly organised by the International Aids Society (IAS) and Thai Ministry of Public Health. The six-day conference began on Sunday. Around 20,000 delegates including UN Secretary General Kofi Annan are attending the conference.

Patel said Bangladesh has every opportunity to maintain its low prevalence rate of HIV through development of leadership at all levels including the political arena, village levels and media world.

"The leaders in Bangladesh are shy about speaking directly on HIV/Aids and sexually transmitted diseases. But it is the time to speak directly to break the social stigma and let people know the facts, he said adding that the situation still remained at a very low level, but it might turn to the worst at any time.

"If you look into the fourth national serological survey you will see 4 percent drug users are HIV positive. The situation is alarming. So you have to look into the matter seriously," he said.

"I can at least say money will not be a problem. Already money is there to fight HIV," he added.

Earlier, at a press conference, the World Bank executives from Africa and Europe said that the leaders in South Asia were very reluctant to surface the HIV issue in public. The leaders at all levels starting from state level to grassroots levels in Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh prefer to play a hide-and-seek about HIV and sex issues, they pointed out.

They said the world Bank has committed 380 million US dollar for HIV/Aids prevention programme in Asia, and 1 billion US dollar for 28 sub-Saharan countries in Africa. The performance of China and Thailand are appreciable compared to other Asian nations.

Globally, the number of HIV/Aids cases is 40 million and 15,000 new infections occur everyday. In Bangladesh, official number of HIV cases is only 363, but UNAIDS estimates the number around 15,000.