Health

Six foreign medics sentenced to death for knowingly infecting Libyan children with the virus that causes AIDS launched their final appeal on Wednesday, after more than eight years behind bars for a crime they say they did not commit. The original verdict was widely condemned by the international community and scientific experts.

As the hearing opened, relatives of the victims rallied outside the Tripoli courtroom, holding up pictures of their HIV-infected children, many of whom have died. The verdict will be handed down on 11 July.

Libya's supreme court is expected to uphold the death penalty against the five Bulgarian nurses and a Palestinian doctor, but the verdict is expected to pave the way for a compensation package, and for the sentences to be commuted.

Compensation solution

Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi's son, Seif al-Islam, has said he expected compensation for the infected children's families to be worked out between the Bulgarian government - which last week conferred citizenship on the accused Palestinian doctor Ashraf Hajuj - and the European Union.

"Immediately after the verdict, we will begin to work on a package of measures with a view to a solution," al-Islam told Italy's Corriere della Sera newspaper.

Gaddafi's son said any compensation for the victims would include medical assistance for the infected children, and EU financing of a Libyan national action plan against AIDS. The relatives initially asked for compensation of €10 million ($13.4 million) for each victim, adding however that the amount was negotiable.

Libyan sources close to the case said provided the package was agreed, a final decision on the medics' fate could be reached by 22 June. On the bilateral front, the EU is seeking better Libyan cooperation in combating illegal immigration to Europe, while Tripoli wants a partnership agreement with the EU.

Poor hygiene

Libya's highest court has the authority to commute the death sentences to prison terms that could be served in Bulgaria which has an extradition treaty with Tripoli, according to a Libyan lawyer.

The medics were first arrested in February 1999, and were sentenced to death in May 2004 after being convicted of infecting 438 children with HIV-contaminated blood at a hospital in the Mediterranean city of Benghazi. Since then, 56 of the children have died.

The accused deny the charges and foreign health experts have said the AIDS epidemic in Benghazi, Libya's second city, was probably the result of poor hygiene.

The case has sparked mounting criticism from the European Union and the US, and has hampered Libya's efforts to secure closer ties with the West after Gaddafi's regime renounced efforts to develop weapons of mass destruction in December 2003.

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