Rock star Bono yesterday urged Tony Blair and Gordon Brown to use Britain's influence to transform the future of Africa.

The U2 frontman called on the two men to use Britain's presidency of the G8 and EU next year to lead an international effort to tackle the continent's poverty.

Bono was addressing the Labour Party conference in Brighton, where he was international guest speaker.

The Dublin-based star, who has campaigned on African poverty since the LiveAid and BandAid initiatives of 1984-1985, told delegates: "6,500 Africans dying a day of treatable, preventable disease, dying for want of medicines you and I can get at our local chemist, that's not a cause, that's an emergency."

He also warned that the West was likely to fall short of its targets for combating poverty.

"You know we made a promise to halve poverty by the year 2015 - a big Millennium promise - but we're not even going to make it by 2115," said Bono.

"It's not enough to describe Everest, we've got to climb it and we've got to bring everyone else along."

He called on the West during 2005 to "double aid, double its effectiveness, and double trouble for corrupt leaders."

He concluded: "We are the first generation that can look extreme and stupid poverty in the eye, look across the water to Africa and elsewhere and say this and mean it: We have the cash, we have the drugs, we have the science but do we have the will? Do we have the will to make poverty history?

"Some say we can't afford to. I say we can't afford not to."