Libya sentences medics to death over Aids infections

A LIBYAN court sentenced six Bulgarian medics to death yesterday on charges that they intentionally infected more than 400 children with the Aids virus, Bulgarian national radio reported in Sofia.

International observers had been monitoring the trial in the coastal city of Benghazi, where the Bulgarians, five nurses and a doctor, were employed at a hospital when they were arrested in February, 1999.

Prosecutors had demanded death sentences, accusing the Bulgarians of intentionally infecting the children with HIV-contaminated blood as part of an experiment to find a cure for Aids. Twenty-three of the children reportedly have since died of Aids.

Initially Libya claimed the infections were part of a conspiracy by the CIA and Israeli intelligence, though it has backed away from those allegations.

All six had pleaded not guilty, and the defence have argued poor hygiene led to the contamination.

The speaker of Bulgaria’s parliament Ognyan Gerdzhikov, said there would be appeals against the verdicts. The court condemned the six to death by firing squad.

Bulgarian government spokesman Dimitar Tsonev said that the verdict was “unacceptable”.

The court yesterday declared not guilty the police officers charged with torturing the detainees.

The Bulgarians have claimed they were tortured during police interrogation, saying they were jolted with electricity, beaten and jumped on. Two of the women said they were raped.

Dr Luc Montagnier, the French co-discoverer of the virus that causes Aids, said poor hygiene at the Benghazi hospital probably led to the contamination, and estimated it happened in 1997, more than a year before the Bulgarians were hired.