CLINTON GREETED AS A STAR FOR WORK FIGHTING EPIDEMIC

Toronto -- Nearly six years out of office, former President Bill
Clinton found himself a revered elder statesman and a bit of an AIDS
superstar as he held court here for two days at this 16th
international conference on the global epidemic.

His chosen role as a former head of state is to devote much of the
work of his William J. Clinton Foundation in New York to combatting
the disease that devastated central and southern Africa during his presidency.

Clinton has been instrumental in lowering the cost of antiviral drugs
to as little as $120 per patient a year in poor nations, and he
wasn't hesitant to remind delegates here of his good work.

And although it was President Bush who boosted international AIDS
spending to $15 billion over five years, Clinton brushed aside
criticism on Monday that he did not do enough for AIDS while in office.

"I did make a lot of mistakes when I was president," he said, rolling
his eyes. "But that was not one of them."

His audience was generally hostile to the Bush administration's
stress on abstinence education as a mandated component of the
President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, or PEPFAR, but Clinton
told delegates that "PEPFAR, on balance, has done a terrific amount of good."

He was reluctant to harshly criticize the abstinence component
because he said there is evidence that it delays the onset of sexual
activity in young people. But he told reporters that "the evidence is
that abstinence-only programs are ultimately unsuccessful," because
evidence shows that teens who pledge to forgo sex are less likely to
use condoms when they become sexually active.

Clinton was much more forceful in criticizing the Bush
administration's policy requiring grantees of overseas prevention
dollars to declare their opposition to prostitution. As a
consequence, Brazil refused a grant of $40 million in USAID funding.

"I don't see how you can go into a country with a lot of sex workers
and not deal with sex workers," he said. "We should just say, 'We
disapprove of prostitution. Here's the money. Let's go save some lives.' "

In a wide-ranging 40-minute discussion with reporters, Clinton
acknowledged it was a mistake to have opposed federal funding of
needle-exchange programs in the face of evidence that it helped
reduce infections in injection drug users. "Yeah, I think I was
wrong," he said. "We need to act on the evidence, whether it's AIDS,
global warming or whatever."

Clinton had warm praise for the Global Fund to Fight AIDS,
Tuberculosis and Malaria, the U.N.-inspired agency that has raised
billions from governments -- and recently $500 million from the Bill
& Melinda Gates Foundation -- to fight the three scourges.

Clinton singled out Executive Director Richard Feachem of the Global
Fund, who is leaving that post at yearend, for his stewardship of the
organization. "Countless people are alive today because of Richard's
work," he said.

The former president seemed at times wistful about his role as elder
statesman. "I've had a totally improbable life," he said, reflecting
on his Arkansas roots. He noted that his 60th birthday was just days
away. "One day I woke up," he said, "and I was the oldest person in the room."

He said that he will remain committed to fighting AIDS until the end
of his days or the end of the epidemic. "Even my worst critics never
accused me of being a quitter," he said. "I can't conceive of
anything that will divert me from this commitment, short of a
life-threatening illness -- or success.

"If Father Time doesn't get me," he told reporters, "I'll be here
until we turn it around."