Kampala — CIVIL society activists have opposed the Government's move to criminalise intentional spread of HIV/AIDS.

"There is no law subjecting all Ugandans to mandatory testing. Our law is just silent about this critical matter to see that everyone knows his status," said David Baguma, the Chairman of Uganda Network on Law and Ethics and HIV/AIDS.

Baguma stressed that many people go into sexual relationships without knowing their status, thus spreading the virus ignorantly.

"If a person involves in any sexual act without knowing his or her status, how would you prove that he infected his partner deliberately? What the Government wants to introduce is very irrelevant because it can never apply," he said.

The parliamentary committee on HIV/AIDS is coming up with a law to criminalise intentional transmission of HIV/AIDS. He asked the Government to sensitise people on voluntary testing other than introducing such laws that merely traumatise them.