German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer welcomed today the deal struck between South Africa and drug firms over cheaper access to AIDS drugs and said Berlin would push leading industrial nations to do more on the issue.
Mr Fischer said the decision by drugs companies to drop a lawsuit against Pretoria yesterday opened the way for poor countries to get better access to drugs without endangering the patent rights he said were so important for research.
He praised what he said had been the constructive role of unlisted German drugs group Boehringer-Ingelheim in reaching a deal and said governments and industry should now build on this cooperation in helping fight disease.
In view of the catastrophic effects of AIDS and other epidemic diseases for the development chances of the Third World, governments there, governments of industrial countries and pharmaceutical companies are called upon to pursue the way that has been opened to cooperation, Mr Fischer said.
Germany will also emphatically pursue this starting point within the framework of the G8, he said.
The Group of Eight (G8) -- the world's seven leading industrial nations, plus Russia -is due to hold a summit in Genoa, Italy in July.