Libya
has repeatedly reiterated its position on the trial in the case
of the HIV infection of 393 children at the Benghazi hospital: the trial
will be fair and impartial. The speech of Libyan leader Muammar Qaddafi
in Abuja, Nigeria, in which he blamed the HIV epidemic in Libya on a CIA
and Mossad conspiracy, has raised some doubt.
A number of foreign leaders have committed themselves, officially and
unofficially, to help Bulgaria and urge Tripoli for a transparent and just
trial.
In 2001 and 2001 the Bulgarian Foreign Ministry held sustained consultations
with the Arab states which have embassies in Sofia and with the European
Union member states. Mutual agreement was reached to use every opportunity
and insist to the official Libyan institutions that the authorities in
Tripoli ensure conditions for a fair and impartial trial.
International organizations have also taken a stand on the case. The
International Association of Democratic Lawyers declared itself in defence
of the Bulgarian defendants, Amnesty International condemned the ill-treatment
of the Bulgarian health professionals in Libya, and Arab League Secretary
General Amre Moussa obtained a promise from Tripoli of a fair, transparent
and depoliticized trial.
LIBYA
At the early stages of the Bulgarians' trial, Libya repeatedly promised
Bulgarian officials, including President Peter Stoyanov, the then foreign
minister Nadezhda Mihailova, 38th National Assembly Chairman Yordan Sokolov
and Prosecutor General Nikola Filchev, that the trial would be fair and
impartial.
On April 27, 2001, addressing a conference in the Nigerian capital
Abuja, the Libyan leader Muammar Qaddafi delivered a speech in which, without
making a specific mention of the Bulgarian health professionals, accused
the CIA and Mossad of conspiring to infect Libyan children with AIDS. "This
is something terrible, a catastrophe, an odious crime. We have found a
doctor and a group of nurses who possessed the HIV virus and who were asked
to experiment effect of viruses of this type, AIDS, on the children in
question," Colonel Qaddafi said in Abuja. "Who charged them with this odious
task? Some said it was the CIA. Others said it was Mossad... The court
trial is going on, it will become an international trial, like the Lockerbie
trial," the Libyan leader added.
EGYPT
Egypt was one of the first countries to be approached by Bulgaria for
help on the Tripoli trial. The then Bulgarian prime minister Ivan Kostov
visited Cairo on September 27, 2000 and conferred with President Hosni
Mubarak. According to the Associated Press and the local press, Kostov
asked Mubarak, who is an influential figure in the Arab world, to intercede
with Qaddafi for the release of the Bulgarian medics. The Al Ahram newspaper
then reported that the Egyptian President intended to raise the question
at a scheduled meeting with Qaddafi in early October. Kostov said that
his position met with the Egyptian head of state's understanding.
Earlier, foreign minister Nadezhda Mihailova had also conferred with
Mubarak to seek assistance.
RUSSIA
Former Russian intelligence officer Viktor Suvorov said on Radio Free
Europe on May 13, 2001 that Russian President Vladimir Putin could secure
the Bulgarians' release from Colonel Qaddafi but waited to receive such
a request from Bulgaria.
At a news conference in Moscow on May 28, Russian Foreign Minister
Igor Ivanov was asked about Russia's position on the trial in Tripoli.
He answered that this is a bilateral matter between Libya and Bulgaria.
Ivanov said, however, that Moscow would view in a positive light an invitation
from Bulgaria to help the defendant medics if Russia is offered to take
part in an international team of experts on the case. At the same news
conference, the chief Russian diplomat announced that Muammar Qaddafi was
to visit Moscow shortly.
US
The US Embassy in Sofia declared that Washington hopes the Bulgarian
health professionals would have a fair trial. The American diplomats, however,
declined to comment on Qaddafi's statement about a CIA plot to infect Libyan
children with AIDS.
In the 2000 Country Reports on Human Rights Practices, the US Department
of State mentioned Libya's poor prison conditions and quoted two of the
Bulgarian defendants in the HIV infection case as claiming that "their
confessions had been obtained under duress." The Reports also criticized
the administration of the death penalty in Libya, including by sentences
passed without trial.
US State Secretary Colin Powell (May 5, 2004):
The US is continuing to carefully follow the trial of the Bulgarian medics in Libya, US Secretary of State Colin Powell said emerging a meeting with Bulgarian Foreign Minister Solomon Passy late on May 5. Powell said he assured Passy that the US will continue to follow this matter very closely and do everything it can to bring pressure on the Libyan Government to resolve this matter so the Bulgarian medics are released and can return home. "The Minister and I have discussed this issue every time we have gotten together. I hope that the Libyan decision coming down from their courts, hopefully in the next 24 hours, will be a positive one", Powell said.
ISRAEL
Israel's Ambassador in Sofia Emanuel Zisman dismissed Qaddafi's allegations
that the Israeli intelligence service Mossad was behind the AIDS epidemic
in Benghazi as "a fabrication and a lie. "I have complete confidence in
the Bulgarian nurses and doctors in Libya. There is absolutely no relations
between their humane mission and Israel," Zisman told the Troud daily.
SOUTH AFRICA
South African Foreign Minister Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma promised her Bulgarian
counterpart Nadezhda Mihailova in Warsaw in June 2001 that South Africa
will continue to cooperate in the search for a fair and impartial trial
for the Bulgarian defendants in Tripoli.
The Bulgarian press has speculated that former South African president
Nelson Mandela could arrange an exchange of the health professionals for
Abdel Basset al-Megrahi, the Libyan who received a life sentence in the
Lockerbie bombing trial. Mandela convinced Qaddafi to surrender the Libyan
suspects in the Lockerbie case in exchange for lifting of the international
sanctions. For the time being, however, the US and Britain have not removed
the embargo against Tripoli. Qaddafi's statement that the non-Libyan defendants
will have an international trial like the Lockerbie trial has given rise
to allegations that the Libyan leader would use the Bulgarian medics' fate
as a bargaining chip.
CHINA
On a visit to Sofia in late June 2000, Chinese Foreign Minister Tang Jiaxuan
promised his host Nadezhda Mihailova assistance in ensuring a fair and
transparent trial for the Bulgarian health professionals. Tang promised
to discuss the matter with the Libyan leadership.
Amnesty International
15 September 2000
Libya: Concerns about health professionals' trial
Amnesty International fears that 16 health professionals on trial in Libya may receive the death penalty. The defendants are accused of infecting nearly 400 children with the HIV virus, while in a Libyan hospital. According to the Libyan authorities 23 of these children had died by the end of 1999. The charges are formulated under three articles of the Libyan Penal Code which prescribe the death sentence.
The organization's concerns are heightened by the fact that the defendants are alleged to have been tortured and that there have been serious irregularities in their pre-trial proceedings.
The trial of the nine Libyans and seven foreign health professionals, including one Palestinian and six Bulgarians, was formally opened on 7 February in Tripoli, before a People's Court but the hearings has been postponed on three occasions. The next hearing is now scheduled for 17 September 2000.
The defendants were arrested in January 1999, and have been held for about 10 months without access to the outside world, relatives or legal representatives. The foreign nationals on trial were only allowed access to defence lawyers after the opening of the trial. In mid-May 2000 the Libyan defence lawyer for the Bulgarian defendants told the media that he had only met his clients on two occasions.
The Libyan defence lawyer also reported that two Bulgarian defendants and the Palestinian defendant claimed that their confessions had been obtained under duress. Earlier, Bulgarian officials complained that the Libyan authorities have not reacted to their call to investigate the defendant's allegations of having been forced into false confessions.
Amnesty International calls on the Libyan authorities to conduct impartial and prompt investigations into the allegations of ill-treatment and torture of the defendants and ensure that they have adequate access to their relatives, legal representatives and doctors.
"The Libyan authorities should ensure that the defendants are tried according to international standards of fair trial," Amnesty International said, "And give assurances that the defendants will not be sentenced to death."
Amnesty International
27 April 2004
Libya: Time to make human rights a reality
Excerpted from a report published after a four-member Amnesty International delegation
visited the Libyan Arab Jamahiriya for two weeks in February 2004, following
a 15-year absence from the country.
Foreign nationals in the so-called HIV trial
In a separate case, over five years after their arrest in January 1999, six Bulgarian health professionals (Kristiana
Malinova Valcheva, Nasya Stojcheva Nenova, Valentina Manolova Siropulo, Valya
Georgieva Chervenyashka, Snezhanka Ivanova Dimitrova and Zdravko Marinov Georgiev) and one Palestinian doctor (Ashraf
Ahmad Jum'a) are still on trial, alongside nine Libyan doctors. The foreign defendants are accused of deliberately infecting 426 children with the HIV virus(42), while working in al-Fateh Children's Hospital in Benghazi. At the time of writing, a verdict was scheduled to be handed down on 6 May 2004.
While Amnesty International recognizes the pressing need to bring to justice anyone responsible for the tragic consequences for these children and their families, it is imperative that the rights of the accused are respected at all stages, from the moment of their arrest. It is only by means of a fair trial that follows due legal process that the truth will emerge about how these children became infected with the HIV virus and those responsible be held fully to account.
After their arrest, the seven foreign nationals were held for more than a year with only intermittent access to the outside world, namely to their relatives and lawyers and, in the case of the Bulgarian nationals, to representatives from their embassy. For the first nine months, representatives from the Bulgarian Embassy in Tripoli met the defendants three times before meetings with the Embassy became more regular from June 2000. They met defendants on 25 February 1999, 29 April 1999 and 30 October 1999. Not all of the defendants were present at the first two meetings. For example, Nasya Stojcheva Nenova and Valya Georgieva Chervenyashka were not brought to the meeting on 25 February 1999, apparently because they exhibited scars of torture which they had undergone.
The seven foreign nationals were first brought before the Popular Prosecution Office on 16 May 1999, approximately four months after their arrest. They were subsequently taken to the Popular Prosecution Office every 30 to 45 days in order to have their detention order renewed. The first time they were granted access to a lawyer was in February 2000, after their trial had opened before the People's Court.
The very limited access to the outside world, in the form of the representatives of the Bulgarian Embassy for the Bulgarian nationals and of the Popular Prosecution Office for all the foreign defendants, did not safeguard the defendants against torture or ill-treatment. When the defendants were granted limited access to the outside world, they explained that they were too frightened to report their allegations of torture. The Bulgarian defendants told Amnesty International delegates that those torturing them instructed them not to mention their treatment to their diplomatic representatives. At the level of the prosecution, defendants said that they were taken to the Popular Prosecutor by some of those who had carried out the torture and were threatened with further torture if they did not "confess" in front of him. In the case of Ashraf Ahmed Jum'a, he was reportedly beaten on one occasion in the Popular Prosecution Office.
The foreign defendants told Amnesty International that they had been tortured in order to extract confessions, which they later retracted on the basis that they had been forcibly coerced. Methods of torture they reported included: extensive use of electric shocks; being suspended from a height by the arms; blindfolding and threats with being attacked by barking dogs; and beatings, including falaqa (beatings on the soles of the feet) and with electric cables. They said that they were tortured for approximately two months; sometimes on a daily basis. After that, the torture ceased to be used on them routinely. When Ashraf Ahmed Jum'a's parents saw him for the first time on 30 November 1999, 10 months after his arrest, they described their reaction to Amnesty International: "We
did not recognize our son because he looked so terrible. We stood there for 10
minutes just holding each other and crying."
All the foreign defendants deny the accusations against them. Valentina Manolova Siropulo told Amnesty International: "I was denying the accusations against me [even after the torture had started] until they began with the electric shocks. I began to "confess" in
order to stop them using electric shocks. They would raise or lower the voltage
according to what I said."
Their trial began before the People's Court. However, in February 2002 their case was transferred to the Criminal Prosecution Service, which forms part of the ordinary criminal justice system. In May 2002 the foreign nationals raised allegations of torture before the prosecutor. On the basis of these allegations, the prosecutor referred the defendants for a medical examination. In June 2002 a Libyan doctor, appointed by the prosecutor, examined the defendants and, in all cases except for Zdravko Marinov Georgiev, found traces on their bodies which he argued resulted from "physical coercion" or "beatings" or both. This evidence was subsequently refuted in court by another Libyan doctor, called to give expert opinion, who argued that it would have been impossible to identify traces of torture after so much time had passed but did not examine the defendants himself.
On the basis of these allegations, eight members of the security forces and two others (a doctor and a translator) in their employ were charged in connection with the torture. They face trial alongside the foreign and Libyan health professionals before the same criminal court in Benghazi. Some of the officers alleged that they themselves had been tortured in order to confess that they inflicted torture on the defendants in the trial. At least one of them confessed to having tortured some of the defendants and named several of the others as having tortured them too. Another officer reportedly denied torturing them himself but said that he had witnessed others torturing them. During the February 2004 visit, Amnesty International delegates interviewed two of the police officers accused of having inflicted torture, who denied the allegations against them.
After the Criminal Court in Benghazi sentenced to death the five Bulgarian nurses
and the Palestinian doctor (May 6, 2004)
Bulgarian President Georgi Purvanov (May 6, 2004):
"Bearing in mind the facts and materials uncovered so far and the categorical conclusions of leading AIDS experts, the guilt of the Bulgarians can hardly be considered proved," President Georgi Purvanov told the press in a special statement immediately after the Criminal Court in Benghazi said that it sentenced to death five of the six Bulgarian defendants. "I would like to believe that the next court instance will make an unbiased and comprehensive analysis of the collected evidence and come out with a fair judgement as soon as possible." The President assured the Bulgarian medical workers and their families that the Bulgarian state will persevere in its efforts to guarantee a fair outcome of the trial.
Irish Minister for Foreign Affairs Mr. Brian Cowen
T.D., EU External Relations Commissioner Christopher Patten and EU High Representative for the Common Foreign and Security Policy Javier Solana spoke on behalf of the EU about the sentences against the Bulgarian medics at a final news conference in Dublin Thursday after the ministerial on EU-Mediterranean Partnership (May 6, 2004).
External Relations Commissioner Christopher
Patten:This verdict casts a shadow over the
EU's recently improving relations with Libya. The EU was shocked and deeply concerned
by the sentences, hopes that the Libyan authorities would promptly consider this
concern and the fully justified stand of the Bulgarian Government.
Speaking to Libyan Foreign Minister Abd al-Rahman Shalgam, Irish Foreign Minister Brian
Cowen, whose country currently holds the rotating presidency of the EU, expressed deep concern over the verdict and the death sentences. He said he insisted before Libya's chief diplomat on finding a satisfactory solution proceeding from the criteria set by the EU for improving its relations with Libya.
The EU Presidency and the EU Troika met Libyan Foreign Minister Abd al-Rahman Shalgam in Dublin, and expressed deep disappointment over the sentences and insisted that Libya carefully assess the need to have them reconsidered.
German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder (Berlin, May
6, 2004):
Germany can and will try to help solve the humanitarian issue of the Bulgarian medics in Libya in their interest, Schroeder told a news conference after meeting Bulgarian Prime Minister Simeon Saxe-Coburg-Gotha who is on a one-day working visit to Germany. He described the sentences of the five Bulgarians as "unacceptable". He declined to reveal details of a discussion on the Libyan sentences he had had with the Bulgarian government leader, saying that giving it too much publicity could harm the efforts for reconsidering the sentences. He called on the Bulgarian public not to overexpose the issue as this may impede the mission's success.
Council of Europe
(Strasbourg, May 6, 2004):
Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly President Peter Schieder Peter Schieder
said he was devastated at the news from Tripoli. "I hope that an appeal will be made and that the court ruling will be reversed. I do hope that goodwill will prevail in Tripoli, which has just reopened its dialogue with Europe," he said.
"Throughout Europe, capital punishment has long been abolished or no longer used, and we would expect Libya to subscribe to this fundamental value," he said.
European Commission
Statement of President Prodi
(6 May 2004):
We have learnt this morning that the Court in Benghazi today sentenced the Bulgarian medics to death.
It appears that the Court said that they deliberately infected hundreds of Libyan children with the HIV virus.
The EU has repeatedly expressed its serious concerns regarding the conduct of the investigations, the treatment of the defendants and the delays in bringing the case to a conclusion. It has also expressed concerns about the lack of compelling evidence of the guilt of the defendants. The case was made to the Libyans authorities again this morning when the Troika met with them in Dublin at the Euromed Ministerial meeting.
The Commission is extremely preoccupied and deeply disappointed by the court's ruling. While it had expressed its solidarity with the Libyan families and in continues to do so, it also reiterates its total opposition to the death penalty.
The Commission remains in contact with the Libyan authorities and will urge them to reconsider the case to reach a satisfactory situation at soonest.
Amnesty International
Press Release
6 May 2004
Libya: Quash death sentences against foreign medical professionals
Six foreign medical professionals were sentenced to death by firing squad by the Benghazi Criminal Court in Libya today.
"We are shocked by the imposition of these death sentences and call for the Libyan authorities to immediately quash them," Amnesty International said in response to the sentences.
Those sentenced to death are: five Bulgarian health professionals -- Kristiana Malinova Valcheva, Nasya Stojcheva Nenova, Valentina Manolova Siropulo, Valya Georgieva Chervenyashka and Snezhanka Ivanova Dimitrova -- and one Palestinian doctor -- Ashraf Ahmad Jum'a.
They are accused of deliberately infecting 426 children with the HIV virus, while working in al-Fateh Children's Hospital in Benghazi. Zdravko Marinov Georgiev, a sixth Bulgarian defendant, was sentenced to four years' imprisonment. Nine Libyan doctors in the same trial were all acquitted.
The foreign defendants told Amnesty International delegates, visiting Libya in February 2004, that they were tortured in order to extract confessions, which they later retracted on the basis that they had been forcibly coerced.
Methods of torture they reported included: extensive use of electric shocks; being suspended from a height by the arms; being blindfolded and threatened with being attacked by barking dogs; and beatings, including falaqa (beatings on the soles of the feet), and being beaten with electric cables. It is not yet clear whether they were convicted on the basis of these "confessions" or other evidence.
"Amnesty International reminds the Libyan authorities that evidence extracted
under torture must not be invoked as evidence in any legal proceedings."
The men and women have the right to appeal against their sentences before the Supreme Court. If the death sentences are confirmed, they cannot be implemented without the consent of the country's highest judicial body, the Supreme Council of Judicial Bodies.
"Although the Libyan authorities have repeatedly stated their aim to abolish
the death penalty, death sentences continue to be handed down and implemented.
The Libyan authorities must begin to turn words into action and establish a moratorium
on the death penalty."
On the basis of the allegations of torture, eight members of the security forces and two others (a doctor and a translator) in their employ were charged in connection with the torture. They faced trial alongside the foreign and Libyan health professionals before the same criminal court in Benghazi.
In today's hearing, the court pronounced that it was not competent to examine their cases. It is not clear whether they will be tried before another court or whether the charges against them will not be heard before a court of law.
"Those accused of having carried out acts of torture must stand trial, in
proceedings which are internationally recognized as fair."
Amnesty International recognizes the pressing need to bring anyone responsible for the tragic consequences for these children and their families to justice. However, it is imperative that the rights of the accused are respected at all stages from the moment of their arrest.
It is only by means of a fair trial that follows due legal process that the truth will emerge about how these children became infected with the HIV virus and those responsible be held fully to account.
* * *
U.S. State Department
Daily Press Briefing
Richard Boucher, Spokesman
Washington, DC
May 6, 2004
QUESTION: Bulgarian National Television. Mr. Boucher, five Bulgarian doctors were sentenced to death in Libya on false accusations of causing AIDS to Libyan children. How do you think the United States could help those people? And what do you intend to do?
MR. BOUCHER: The United States has frequently discussed this case with the Bulgarian Government, including the Foreign Minister, who was just here in Washington . We have been following this very closely for five years. I think you know we've been very critical of Libyan violations of the legal and human rights of the Bulgarian medics. We find the verdict that was pronounced in the court to be unacceptable, and we've raised this case frequently with senior Libyan officials.
An official from the U.S. Interests Section in Tripoli attended the trial proceedings in Benghazi . We recognize the great human tragedy that occurred in Benghazi and our deepest sympathy is extended to the families of 400 children who were infected with the HIV/AIDS virus; the death of over 40 children is also a devastating toll.
But in this particular case, we note the defendants have the right to appeal their verdict, and we urge the Government of Libya to take steps to resolve this case quickly.
As the Secretary said yesterday on this, the United States will continue to follow this matter closely and do everything we can to bring pressure on the Libyan Government to resolve this matter so these people are released and can return home.
QUESTION: Same subject?
MR. BOUCHER: Same topic?
QUESTION: Bulgarian National Radio. Did you contact yet somebody of Libyan Government?
MR. BOUCHER: As I said, U.S. officials in Tripoli , who attended the trial, have also been contact with the Libyan Government about this.
QUESTION: Has there been follow-up since the verdict, Richard?
MR. BOUCHER: Now that I look at it, let me make sure absolutely sure it's since the verdict; certainly, we've talked to them all along the way.
QUESTION: Does the Libyans' handling of this case, and what you just said it in your statement, as there are repeated violations of the, I think you said, human rights of the Bulgarian medics, hinder Libya's efforts to get off the -- to get out from under the various U.S. sanctions on them?
MR. BOUCHER: The various U.S. sanctions are often imposed for different reasons. Whether this case has relevance to one or the other, I don't know -- one or the other set of sanctions, I don't know. But it is certainly a matter of importance to us that we have raised and discussed with the Libyan Government and will continue to follow it very closely.
Sir.
QUESTION: A new subject, Georgia?
QUESTION: No, no, no.
MR. BOUCHER: Okay, in a minute.
QUESTION: I just want to make sure that I O I think I know the answer to this, but I was just wondering, did you agree, are you agreeing with the premise of the very first question, that all the accusations against these people are false? Is that why this verdict is unacceptable, or it's --
MR. BOUCHER: I have said we think the verdict is unacceptable. I'll just leave it at that for the moment.
QUESTION: What do you think of the actual charges?
MR. BOUCHER: I'll just say what we think of the verdict at this point.
QUESTION: Why is the verdict unacceptable? Is it unacceptable because the trial went on for five years? Is it unacceptable because there are problems with the sentences?
MR. BOUCHER: I think that the circumstances of the trial, the whole circumstances of the trial and the verdict and the sentences that were reached, we find to be unacceptable.
QUESTION: Well, okay, the Secretary said yesterday that these people should be released and allowed to return home. Mr. Bradtke said the same thing back in February.
MR. BOUCHER: And I said the same thing today.
QUESTION: That would -- and that would imply, at least, that you think that the allegations are without -- well, the charges were without merit. But I just -- I want to make sure that I understand why you think this.
MR. BOUCHER: I will see if we have taken a position on the charges themselves. We think that, certainly, there was a humanitarian tragedy that occurred but that the prosecution of these individuals for that has led to a verdict that we consider unacceptable.
QUESTION: And do you know if your officials or if Assistant Secretary Burns, when he was in Tripoli, or anyone, in their conversations with Qadhafi or higher-ups, have called on him to renounce his suggestion of several years ago that these infections were in fact -- that these infections may have been part of a CIA-Mossad plot to spread AIDS in the Muslim world.
MR. BOUCHER: I don't know if that kind of accusation has ever come up. Certainly, we've made clear over the years that that's about as untrue as anything one can imagine.
QUESTION: Mr. Boucher, a follow-up. As U.S. Government, did you investigate this case thoroughly, what happened exactly in Libya , besides what has happened in the court, as an incident? Did you find out? What is your Ambassador saying in Libya vis-a-vis to this tragedy?
MR. BOUCHER: First of all, we don't have an Ambassador in Libya ; second of all, we haven't had people in Libya for very long; and third of all, we're not an investigating authority in Libya . So the premise is just impossible.
QUESTION: But (inaudible) mention who is in contact with Libya . You might not have an official Ambassador in the capital. But I'm wondering, somebody is representing your interests in Libya , should they then investigate thoroughly this case, what happened besides that?
MR. BOUCHER: We are not an investigating authority in Libya . That's all I can tell you at this point.
MINISTRY OF FOREIGN AFFAIRS OF THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION
11 May 2004
INFORMATION AND PRESS DEPARTMENT
DAILY NEWS BULLETIN
Alexander Yakovenko, the Spokesman of Russia's Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Answers a Question from Bulgarian National Radio Concerning Libya Death Sentence for Bulgarian Medics
1026-11-05-2004
Question: Please comment on the decision of a Libyan court to sentence the Bulgarian medics who worked in Libya to death.
Answer: On May 6 the court of Benghazi passed a death sentence on the five Bulgarian medics who worked under contract in a children's hospital of that city and who were accused of involvement in the infection of 393 Libyan children with the AIDS virus.
According to our information, the Bulgarian medics' lawyers intend to appeal this decision in the Supreme Court of Libya.
For our part, we hope that an additional trial in Tripoli, in which all the facts and the opinions of people involved in this case will be comprehensively examined and taken into account, will help to save the Bulgarian medics' lives.
* * *
World Medical Association
Press Release
15 May 2004
WMA Appeals to Libya to Lift Death Sentences
The World Medical Association has appealed to the Libyan authorities to lift the death sentence on the Palestinian doctor and the five nurses found guilty in Benghazi last week of infecting more than 400 children with AIDs.
Dr Ashraf Ahmad Jum'a and the five nurses were sentenced to death despite evidence at the trial by medical experts that the children's infections were caused by poor hygiene at the hospital where they were working.
Dr Yoram Blachar, chairman of the WMA Council, said after today's meeting of the WMA in Divonne-les-Bains, France:
'I appeal to the Libyan authorities to quash this sentence. It is completely unjustified. I have asked WMA members attending next week's World Health Assembly in Geneva to seek a meeting with their medical colleagues from Libya to see how we can ensure that these health professionals are fairly treated.'
The WMA meeting heard a plea for help from Dr Svetoslav Stoimenov, the Bulgarian delegate to the WMA. He told the meeting that the six health professionals were innocent. He said they had been forcibly detained for more than five years and had been tortured.
* * *
National Assembly President Gerdjikov has sent a letter to the Presidents
of the European Parliaments
Monday, 24 January 2005
National Assembly President Prof. Ognian Gerdjikov has
sent a letter to the Presidents of the Parliaments of European and other countries
he had met before. The letter says:
YOUR EXCELLENCY,
Let me express once again my reasonable and deep concern in respect of the recent declaration of the General PeopleOs Congress of Libya regarding the judicial proceeding against the Bulgarian medics. As is well known, in this document the General PeopleOs Congress of the Libyan Arab Jamahiriya demanded compensations for the families of the children infected with AIDS and the heaviest sentence for those responsible for the epidemic in the pediatric hospital in Benghazi.
I take this opportunity to thank You for Your support so far and to remind You that the Bulgarian State is taking active and consistent steps before the international community so that the problem with the legal proceeding against the Bulgarian medics is settled as soon as possible in a legally justified and humane manner. Bulgaria firmly believes that the Bulgarian medics sentenced to death are innocent O there is sufficient and undeniable evidence of that. Along with that, Bulgaria also makes considerable efforts towards having efficient support provided immediately to the affected Libyan children and their families, as well as towards arriving at a thorough solution to the particularly grave problem of the AIDS expansion in Africa.
Your Excellency,
Referring to the excellent and friendly relations between the parliaments
of our two countries, let me extend an appeal to You to have these noble and
humane causes, which the Republic of Bulgaria firmly defends, supported with
the instruments of the international parliamentary cooperation.
* * *
US Department of State
Daily Press Briefing
Adam Ereli, Deputy Spokesman
Washington, DC
March 25, 2005
QUESTION: Thank you. We are a group of Bulgarian media. We understand that last week the United States, Bulgaria and the European Union had a trilateral meeting in Washington to discuss the case of Bulgarian medics in Libya. What are the results of this meeting and what will be the United States contribution to save the Bulgaria medics in Libya?
MR. ERELI: Let me begin by saying that Secretary Rice and Foreign Minister Passy had a very good meeting today. They talked about, obviously, our bilateral relationship and they agreed that it is in great shape; that we've really developed a strong and warm partnership and that's certainly evidenced in Bulgaria's very important and valuable role in Afghanistan, in Iraq, and in the Balkans and in European institutions as well.
We did discuss the issue of the imprisoned Bulgarian medics in Libya. Secretary Rice affirmed for Foreign Minister Passy the determination of the United States to do everything possible, everything within our power to obtain the release of these prisoners who have been in Libyan prisons for much too long and without cause -- or without justification.
I can tell you that last week senior level officials of the United States, the European Union and Bulgaria met in Washington to discuss the case of these workers and to explore avenues for their release. We will continue with these consultations. We will continue to work together to impress upon Libya our common desire, our commonly shared belief that the medics should be released, that there were serious flaws in the investigation and in the prosecution of the case and that we would like to see them returned to their country as soon as possible.
QUESTION: Sir, first of all, you said that they explored ways. Did they draw any plan or it's too early for this?
MR. ERELI: I think they agreed on the importance of continuing to work together both as a threesome to engage with Libya on the release so that they agreed that they would continue to consult; they would continue to meet. I think they discussed ways of -- and ideas for achieving their release but I don't have any details to share with you.
Thank you.