Bulgaria in talks over Libyan AIDS case

Bulgaria's foreign minister said Friday that negotiations were taking place with the families of Libyan children with HIV, but he cautioned that a deal to allow the release of six medics convicted of infecting them was far from being reached.

Foreign Minister Ivailo Kalfin told Bulgarian National TV that there has been "dynamism" in the past few weeks in the AIDS case, in which five Bulgarian nurses and a Palestinian doctor have been sentenced to death for deliberately infecting 400 Libyan children with HIV in the city of Benghazi.

All six, who have been in Libyan custody since 1999, say they are innocent. Libyan court officials said they admitted infecting the children, but some of the nurses have since said they confessed under beatings and torture.

"I do not expect anything to be announced today, nor can I say when this could happen as talks are still under way," Kalfin said, speaking from Brussels, Belgium.

German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier led a European Union mission to Libya this month to help win the medics' release. The EU has released $3.4 million in aid to help Libya cope with an outbreak of HIV-AIDS in the city of Benghazi.

On a visit to Bulgaria last week, President Bush also urged Libya to free the six, who have been sentenced to death twice, in 2004 and again in 2006 following an appeal.

Last month, nurses Kristiana Valcheva, Nasya Nenova, Valentina Siropulo, Valya Chervenyashka and Snezhana Dimitrova, and Dr. Ashraf al-Hazouz were cleared of defamation charges in a related case, which raised hopes among their supporters.

Libya's Supreme Court will rule on July 11 on their latest appeal.

If the court upholds the convictions and sentences, it is not necessarily the final word. The decision would then go to Libya's Supreme Judicial Council, which could approve the verdict, annul the conviction or set a lighter sentence.

Earlier this week, Bulgaria announced that al-Hazouz, the Palestinian, has been granted Bulgarian citizenship. This would ensure he is treated in the same way as the Bulgarian nurses under an agreement Sofia has with Libya.