GENEVA ?The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria announced on February 22 it had approved a further US$119 million in grants to continue life-saving projects in 16 countries, including Haiti and China.

Some US$35.5 million, more than a third of the total, will go to prevent and treat HIV/AIDS in Haiti, which has the worst epidemic of the killer disease in the Americas, a statement said.

China¡¯s efforts to control a tuberculosis epidemic in poor provinces will receive a fresh grant of US$22.7 million, while a project to control malaria in its southern provinces of Yunnan and Hainan will get US$2.8 million, it said.

This marked the first time that the board of the Geneva-based fund, a private partnership set up in 2002 as the brainchild of UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan, approved renewed funding for an initial batch of project grants approved two years ago.

¡°This is the first point at which funding can be discontinued if grants are not well spent or if performance doesn¡¯t seem to meet the targets laid out,?Global Fund spokeswoman Rosie Vanek said.

The fate of four other initial projects, in three countries (Honduras, Laos and Senegal), had not been decided, she said.

In all, the Global Fund has approved US$3.1 billion for more than 300 grants in 127 countries.

In January 2004, it suspended payments to the Ukraine over concern at mismanagement and slow progress of a programme to boost the number of AIDS sufferers on anti-retroviral drugs. It resumed funding to a new partner there two months later.

(Agencies via Xinhua)