Nation IN BRIEF : NEW YORK : Human Rights Aide Says She Has HIV

A New York City human rights commissioner, saying she hopes to lift “rampant ignorance” shrouding AIDS, disclosed that she tested positive in 1986 for the human immunodeficiency virus that causes the disease. Ilka Tanya Payan said at a news conference that she is “an individual with a serious medical condition that has compromised my immune system--not someone with a religious moral, social or economic class disorder.” Payan, an actress, newspaper columnist and lawyer, is known to Spanish-speaking audiences for roles in soap operas, films and theater.