Cape Town - President A.P.J. Abdul Kalam on Sept. 15 began a four-day trip to South Africa by urging the two countries to work together to tackle the scourge of HIV/AIDS.

Kalam, the first Indian president to set foot on South African soil –– a country with which India has a historic association and checkered diplomatic ties –– arrived at this picturesque legislative capital of South Africa on Sept. 14 after winding up a four-day visit to Tanzania.

Addressing the country’s Parliament, Kalam said that India and South Africa –– the two countries with the highest incidence of HIV/AIDS –– should work together to tackle the scourge of the dreaded epidemic.

Highlighting the need to join forces to tackle the common enemy of poverty as well as HIV/AIDS and other communicable diseases facing both nations, and to build links that could be a model for partnership between developing and developed nations, he said: “It is time that the national and international agencies join together to mount a concerted program in eliminating these dreaded diseases from planet earth.”

“India has ventured into the field of anti-AIDS vaccine and it is in the stage of undergoing various tests. We are also mounting programs to eradicate the new forms of earlier communicable diseases like tuberculosis, waterborne and vector borne diseases.”

“Both our nations are free, independent states in an increasingly complex and interdependent world where the values of friendship and mutual assistance are of paramount importance,” he added.

Kalam’s visit coincided with celebrations marking a decade since the establishment of democracy in the nation previously divided by apartheid under its white rulers, and also with the 100th anniversary of the Phoenix Settlement that Mahatma Gandhi established in Durban as a model township after beginning his crusade against injustice. “We have prepared for this visit a long, long time and, coming at this time, it is a pilgrimage for any Indian leader,” said Indian High Commissioner to South Africa Shiv Shankar Mukherjee. “The visit has a ceremonial aspect as well as substantive aspect to mark the full and intense relationship between the two countries.”

A meeting with Nelson Mandela, the liberator of South Africa from the tentacles of apartheid, scheduled for Sept. 16 was expected to be the highlight of Kalam’s visit.

Prior to that meeting, the Indian head of state attended an elaborate ceremonial reception in this city on Sept. 15, had one-on-one talks with South Africa President Thabo Mbeki and visited the history-soaked Robben Island where Mandela and many current day ministers were imprisoned during the anti-apartheid movement.