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| Africa North |
| Libya foreign medics retrial resumes |
| 2006-06-13 |
| A Libyan court began on Tuesday retrying five Bulgarian nurses and a Palestinian doctor accused of infecting hundreds of Libyan children with HIV, witnesses said. Court President Mahmoud Haouissa began the hearing by reading out the names of the defendants and asking them to confirm their presence. Libya's supreme court overturned death sentences in December against the nurses and the Palestinian doctor, who are accused of deliberately injecting 426 youngsters with the virus, and ordered a retrial. Washington has long backed Bulgaria and the European Union in saying the medics, in jail in Libya since 1999, are innocent. Around 50 of the children have died and the case has fuelled outrage among the families of the victims. Bulgaria and its allies say the medics were tortured to confess and global AIDS experts say the outbreak at the Benghazi hospital where they worked first happened before they arrived. The first session of the retrial was rapidly adjourned on May 11. The judge said the postponement was needed to allow lawyers who lacked proper papers to bring the documents to court. Tripoli has suggested the nurses could go free if Bulgaria pays compensation to the children and their families, who have demanded 4.4 billion euros ($NZ8.8 billion). Bulgaria has refused to pay, saying this would be an admission of guilt.But the United States, the EU, Libya and Bulgaria have agreed to back the establishment of an aid fund, and are seeking ways to help the victims and their families. On April 28, US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said on a visit to Bulgaria that the nurses had been jailed for too long and should be allowed to return home. |
| Posted by:ryuge |
| #1 hedline is confushus |
| Posted by: muck4doo 2006-06-13 22:48 |