Addis Ababa, Ethiopia — Graca Machel, Mozambique's former first lady, Tuesday appealed to African youth to rise to the challenges of HIV/AIDS, noting that they were worst-hit by the pandemic.

Addressing the ongoing second African Development Forum in Addis Ababa, under the theme, "AIDS: The Greatest Leadership Challenge," Machel said the young people were the key to the prevention of the scourge in Africa.

"They are the group that inherits this catastrophe. Yet we continue to marginalise them, not recognising their strength and not building on their potential," she observed.

In her address on "Leadership and Social Mobilisation on HIV/AIDS," she said adults should listen to young people in Africa and work with them in the fight against the disease.

Machel said African youth and their leaders should work with political, religious, civil society and community leaders in planning and implementing policies to check the spread of the pandemic.

She said that combating HIV/AIDS posed a challenge to African leadership, and required the mobilisation of everyone.

Machel, who is the President of the Addis Ababa Commission of Mozambique, spoke on "three sobering facts" about AIDS: "it has no cure, no vaccine for the virus, and its treatment and medication, still very expensive and out of reach of the vast majority of Africans who need them."

She said it was the primary responsibility and obligation of African governments to protect their citizens.

"Our governments must stop looking at all obstacles holding them back from action and show true leadership of some of our past leaders," Machel declared.

"To live free of HIV/AIDS, free of its pain and suffering, free of its wanton destruction, free of its fear, ...is the right of every child born in every village, every township and every city on this great continent," she declared.