Health News
2005-09-29
Bulgaria rejects
Libya’s “blood money” proposal
Bulgaria has
rejected a proposal that the country pay the families of
HIV-positive children in Benghazi, Liby
Bulgaria has
rejected a proposal that the country pay the families of
HIV-positive children in Benghazi, Libya, a diya, or
“blood money,” to gain the release of
five Bulgarian and one Palestinian health workers
sentenced to death for allegedly deliberately infecting the
children with the virus, Agence France-Presse reports.
Libyan officials floated the proposal earlier this
month in an attempt to resolve growing tensions
between the countries over the death sentences given to the
health care workers. AIDS experts testified at the
trial of the workers that the HIV infections occurred
at the Benghazi hospital due to unsanitary conditions
and practices by hospital staff, and that they occurred
before the foreign workers arrived there, but a Libyan
court in 2004 found the workers guilty and sentenced
them to death. An appeal is expected to be heard in
Libyan courts in November.
Bulgarian foreign
minister Ivailo Kalfin told his Libyan counterpart at
the United Nations General Assembly meeting last week that
his country would not pay “blood money”
to the families of the HIV-positive children because
the health workers had committed no crime and were not
responsible for their infections.
The health
workers have been held in Libya since 1999. Several have
complained of being tortured while imprisoned.
(Advocate.com)
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