An HIV-positive Cambodian man has been sentenced to 10 years in jail for trying to infect his wife by raping her without using a condom, court officials said Friday.
Meas My, 40, was found guilty Thursday at Phnom Penh Municipal court, marking the first conviction under Cambodia's landmark AIDS law passed in 2003, they said.
The law allows courts to jail people for 10 to 15 years for infecting or trying to infect others with HIV.
"He intended to infect his wife with HIV. He sometimes said he wanted his wife to die with him," prosecutor Ngeth Sarath said, adding that the man's wife knew he was HIV-positive.
"During sex, he did not use a condom, making the wife run away from their bed. When she refused to have sex with him, he beat her up," the prosecutor said.
Meas My was arrested in January after his wife told police about his repeated sexual assaults.
The prosecutor declined to say whether the woman, whose identity was withheld to protect her privacy, was infected with HIV.
"This is a message for husbands infected with HIV/AIDS that they must not infect their wives," Ngeth Sarath said.
Cambodia has the highest prevalence of HIV/AIDS in Asia, with 1.9 percent of the population, or approximately 123,000 people, infected,
The highest number of new HIV infections — about 40 percent — occur in married women in the impoverished country, according to United Nations and government statistics.
