Libyan AIDS families say deal held up over compensation

Lack of agreement on compensation is holding up a deal in the case of six foreign medics sentenced to death in Libya after being convicted of infecting children with the AIDS virus, the children's' families said on Friday.

"Despite difficult negotiations, a compromise was found on the different points of the deal, including the children's care and treatment, but there is still one sticking point concerning the compensation," they said in a statement.

And Bulgaria's foreign minister confirmed on Friday that a deal was still far from being reached to resolve the case of the five Bulgarian nurses and a Palestinian doctor.

"There's been dynamism (in negotiations with the families) in the past few weeks but the case is still far from a solution," Ivailo Kalfin told Bulgarian national radio over the phone from Brussels.

"I cannot say when a deal will be agreed or announced as talks are still underway," the minister added.

On Thursday, EU External Relations Commissioner Benita Ferrero-Waldner had also played down reports of an imminent deal in the case.

Nevertheless, an official with the Kadhafi Foundation, a charity headed by the son of Libyan leader Moamer Kadhafi that has been involved in the negotiations, saw hope in the families' statement.

Their acceptance of a deal in principle "shows that we are close to the end of the tunnel," Salah Abdessalem said on Friday.

Families' spokesman Idriss Lagha also voiced optimism, saying that "if a compromise is reached on the last point (of compensation) the agreement will be considered a renunciation by the families of the death sentence handed down to the medics."

Libyan sources had said a simultaneous announcement could be made on Friday in Tripoli and Brussels, where EU leaders are gathered for a summit meeting.

The nurses and Palestinian doctor, who recently obtained Bulgarian citizenship, were arrested in 1999 accused of infecting 438 children with HIV-tainted blood at a hospital in the Mediterranean city of Benghazi.

They were sentenced to death in May 2004, while 56 infected children have died.

The six have denied the charges and foreign health experts have said the epidemic in Libya's second city was probably the result of poor hygiene.

If there was a deal, their death sentences could be commuted and any new sentence served out in Bulgaria, as Libya and Bulgaria have an extradition agreement.

The EU has expressed its opposition to any deal it sees as blackmail or compensation to the families.

Instead it has supported "a special assistance fund" which will serve, among other elements, to ensure free medical treatment of the sick.

"For us, the essential thing is to guarantee treatment of the children," another spokesman for the families' association, Ramadan al-Fituri, said on Thursday.

A Libyan official told AFP on Friday that Tripoli had persuaded "certain European countries, including Bulgaria" to convert Libya's debts into contributions into a medical fund which would ensure free treatment of the sick.

Negotiations were now underway to persuade the families to review and reduce their financial demands, said the official, who asked not to be named.

The case has sparked mounting criticism from the EU and the United States and hindered Libya's efforts at rapprochement with the West after Kadhafi's regime renounced efforts to develop mass destruction weapons in December 2003.

US President George W. Bush appealed for the release of the medics last week during a visit to Bulgaria.