My friends, let us not leave Melbourne thinking that it will be easy to reach the summit. Complacency will cause us to stumble. Will future generations say that we squandered the opportunity of a lifetime? I know the path will be steep and the obstacles many. Let us do this in memory of our colleagues who died en route to Melbourne and the millions who have died of AIDS-related illnesses and of the tens of millions of people living with HIV. If every person here tonight, and everyone working to end the epidemic, acts with the same sense of urgency, the same hope and the same commitment to fight for those left behind, we will scale this mountain. But only if we go arm in arm will we reach the top and the end.

Full text of speech given by Peter Piot, UNAIDS Executive Director, at the African Summit on HIV/AIDS, TB and other related infectious diseases 24 to 27 April 2001 in Abuja, Nigeria.

Where already tens of millions are infected, where tens of millions are dying, and where a hundred million more may become infected and die in the future. Where half of every new generation of boys and girls in the worst affected countries will die of AIDS.