Qathafi's son considers Bulgarian nurses in AIDS case innocent
Libya-Bulgaria, Politics, 11/11/2005

Seif al-Islam al-Qathafi, the son of the Libyan leader Muammar al-Qathafi said on Thursday that he personally does not consider that the five Bulgarian nurses who were sentenced to death on charges of transferring the AIDS/HIV virus to hundreds of Libyan children as guilty.

Al-Qathafi told reporters after he was asked if he considers the five nurses guilty "I personally do not thing so, but in spite of that, we have a catastrophe. whether it is a conspiracy as they said, and which I do not believe, or it is a neglect or maladministration, we by the ultimate end have a catastrophe. It is a reality that we can not ignore."

He added "as you know, I am not a legal expert, but I do not think the matter was planned for, or is a conspiracy. This is my special feeling."

This case has become an obstacle on the way to improve the Libyan relations with the west, especially that both the European Union and the US continue demanding the release of the five Bulgarian nurses. The US President George W. Bush stressed in October the need to free the five nurses saying they need to be pardoned and released. The European Union called for the release of the Bulgarian nurses on October 6th, deploring the "criminality in which they are treated."

The five Bulgarian nurses, in addition to one Palestinian doctor, were convicted and sentenced to death on May 6, 2004 on charge of transferring AIDS/HIV to 426 Libyan children in Benghazi hospital, of whom 51 were died so far. The detained persons appealed since one and a half years the sentence, basing their appeal to the experience of renowned scientists, including one professor who discovered the AIDS/HIV virus, and they stressed to the court that the bad health conditions in the hospital is behind the Children's infection with the virus, and that the conditions were bad before the arrival of the five nurses, and that the only evidence taken against them was their admission taken under torture. The supreme Libyan court will give its sentence to the appeal submitted by the convicted person next Tuesday.

Previous Stories:
  Libyans protests against Bush call to release Bulgarian nurses   (10/19/2005)
  Libya calls Bulgaria for direct negotiations with AIDS victims   (8/18/2005)
  Sofia doubts Libyan sentence on officers' not guilty of torturing nurses   (6/8/2005)
  Libyan court adjourned Bulgarian nurses case sentence   (6/1/2005)

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