Just when Libya appears to have reconciled itself with the western world, a fresh development comes along to confound such a notion. The judicial decision that a Palestinian doctor and five Bulgarian nurses deliberately infected 400 Libyan children with HIV, and consequently are sentenced to death, is a travesty of justice of outrageous proportions. It is an unashamed political verdict which flies in the face of the evidence.
The outbreak of HIV at the Benghazi hospital eight years ago led to the arrest of 23 mostly Bulgarian health workers. The following year, five nurses and two doctors were put on trial accused of initiating "uncontrolled murder of people with the aim of undermining state security". Long before the court reached a verdict, Libya's leader Col Gadaffi said the defendants were guilty and acted in collusion with the CIA or Mossad or both.
To no great surprise the court duly found all but one of the defendants guilty. However, an appeal to the Supreme Court successfully quashed the verdict and the defendants were sent back for retrial. Unfortunately, this latest trial was even more unfair than the first. The only evidence offered against them was a report cobbled together by five Libyan doctors which was long on anecdote and devoid of facts. Evidence from Aids experts that the epidemic started at least one year before the Bulgarians arrived was ignored, as was testimony that the outbreak was actually caused by poor hygiene and sterilisation practices. The defendants claimed they were beaten and raped in order to extract confessions.
The anger of the families of the infected children is intense. This week an eight year-old boy died, the 53rd victim of what the government claims is an international plot to kill Muslims. Benghazi and the area surrounding it is hostile to the government; it would be unthinkable for oil-rich Col Gadaffi to admit that lack of investment led to the childrens' deaths.
If the death sentences are confirmed, Libya's rapprochement with the West - admitting involvement in the Lockerbie bombing and paying compensation as well as destroying weapons of mass destruction - will be at risk. But the West, especially the US, does not want to rock the boat when Libya is handing out valuable exploration licences. Libya offered to drop the cases if guilt was admitted and $10 million was paid to the family of each infected child, a total which happens to match the Lockerbie compensation. Having made concessions to embrace the West so that UN sanctions would be lifted, Col Gadaffi seems minded to extract revenge through blackmail and the lives of innocent health-workers.