Themis does not live in Libya.

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Warning: this will be a long post. I mean it.


Hello again, everyone.

Normally, I write more or less on a whim. I may not care about a lot of things, but I do tend to take a side in an argument, perhaps even for the argument’s sake. In such cases, one doesn’t really need to prepare all that much.

This once, I felt that I do. Not because I don’t care, or that I wouldn’t feel like arguing; no, this time it was because I care. It’s because I feel revolted, disguisted, angered, frustrated, desperate, and, quite frankly, sick of it all. It’s because I could not bear to watch a charade that has unfolded over the course of the last seven years, and yet could not, in all honesty, not watch it. It’s not a massive human tragedy with thousands of wasted lives, and it’s not a cinematic, awe-inspiring natural cataclysm. It only has hundreds of victims, billions of dollars, and the smaller countries involved. A pocket-sized tragedy, if you will, but a no less poignant one for all that.

I speak of five nurses, one doctor, and several hundred children, all of which are fated to die.

The children, because they contracted a disease that for all our world-spanning initiatives, for all the wonders of civilization, and all the miracles of technological progress and cooperation we have not yet bested and even tried to combat to the degree that we should: AIDS. They were infected, depending on whom you listen, either because of gross negligence and uncaring or hatred and greed to a degree seldom shown in the hateful and avaricious history of mankind.

The nurses and the doctor, because according to the people holding the second opinion, they did it. According to the same people, the six medics cold-heartedly infected over four hundred children with the HIV-virus in the hospital that they worked in, probably at the behest of foreign intelligence services that apparently cringed at nothing to destabilize the country. The six medics were paid to do something that, in the known history of medicine, few people had ever done even during the times of the Holocaust. They did not do it because they believed it necessary, or beneficial in the long run, or even that it was a fitting vengeance. They did it for money, slowly killing the children left under their care.

I speak of one Palestinian doctor, five Bulgarian nurses, and several hundred Libyan children, who are fated to die. I believe, with all my soul, that if this were to happen, this would be yet another stain on an already tarnished soul, but one that would exceed all others if not in size, if not in viciousness, in the incredible audacity and cold-heartedness of its execution. Even for Moammar Quadafi’s soul, it would be a stain worth noting. It is a saga that is

The process is now in its seventh year. To be quite accurate, we are now in the aftermath of the second process: the first found the six medics guilty and sentenced them to death by firing squad, but due to some discrepancies a new process was scheduled, and so far it has issued the same verdict. The parents of the children, vengeful for the lives that were taken away, have met both verdicts with a mix of vindication, joy, and outright hatred for the perpetrators. Yet to me and many others, their image was painful on two levels: first, because it was tied to the appointed death of six people, five of which are my conationals, that have been through hell on Earth for more than seven years, and second, because it was just wrong. For all the talk of an independent Libyan judiciary coming from Tripoli and Benghazi, I saw a process that was second to none in its failings and political bias.

As a bit of a background, I would like to elaborate on how this started as probably many of you don’t follow the process closely: Bulgaria and Libya have cordial relations since the time we were a communist state and Libya enjoyed the good-ish graces of the Soviet Union. As part of the project to help the “third world” resist imperial encroachment, we helped various countries with money, material aid, and experts in the various fields. Libya had never been particularly rich in trained medics, and it became a passable place for doctors and nurses to work for notably more money than they’d get back home, particularly in the late 1990s as our economy, to put it colloquially but mildly, messed up. In 1998, several nurses and doctors were recruited to work in a Libyan hospital, Al-Fatah. The Palestinian doctor came to the hospital separately, as an intern through an international program. Soon thereafter, however, the clinic experienced a large outbreak of HIV, the biggest in a hospital environment so far and, I hope, ever. After a preliminary inquiry, many of the medics were detained on charges ranging from negligence to mass homicide; most of them were soon released. The six, plus two more people – a Bulgarian nurse and a doctor, the husband of one of the remaining nurses, were eventually found innocent and released. While in custody, the nurses admitted to their guilt, and signed statements that they were paid to infect the children, to the best of their knowledge, by a representative of CIA or Mosad. Later on, in the courtroom, they proclaimed that these statements were extracted under torture, and named their torturers among the guards present in the courtroom.

The processes dragged on, with the verdict delayed more and more so the judges could cope with the evidence, and the anguished parents alternatively present by representatives in the courtroom or protesting outside it. An early report by the WHO, issued following their visit in the hospital in 1999, pointed that the infection probably resulted from the poor hygienic conditions in the hospital, and probably started because of the practice of reusing syringes. In 2003, Luc Montagnier, the founder of the HIV virus, and Italian researcher … published a report that the first infected patient was present in the hospital before the defendants arrived, but the report was not accepted by the court. In the same year, a team of Libyan doctors and professors published another report, refuting the findings of the WHO team and stating that an intentional infection could not be ruled out. Reports did not cease coming – the last one, by Lawyers without Borders and dating as soon as December 2006, supporting the findings of Montagnier. In the meantime, the prison guards who allegedly tortured the nurses and the doctor were tried for misconduct and found innocent, and are now tried in absentia by a Bulgarian court. At the moment, the six medics are waiting for the supreme court to rule on their appeal of the death penalty.

It is a sad tale, tragic enough as it is. What makes it even more appalling, however, is the political aspect to it. Unfortunately, it has been present from the start. Cynics suspected that the arrest of the medics was tied to the outstanding over $ 300 million debt that Bulgaria is owed. Also, they said, there was the small matter that the other foreigners were citizens of stronger and more influential countries, while an admission of the failure of Libyan doctors of the lack of hygiene would be extremely problematic for the regime. Diplomats and politicians spoke on the issue at home and abroad, but their position was uncertain and ambivalent – they could not admit that they are unconcerned, yet they did not want to antagonize Libya. On the other hand, Quadafi wanted compensation for the children, at first reaching $ 10 million per child (the sum has varied, the figure now circulated is $ 2.7 billion). This has been refused by the Bulgarian authorities as it was seen to be an admission of the guilt of the six. The Palestinian authorities, as one could imagine, had little influence over the process. At present, there is an international fund that pays for the treatment of the children abroad. A recent interview of Quadafi argued that the medics could be released on a quid pro quo basis for the Lockerby convict, Abdelbaset Ali Al-Megrahi, and the compensations should be the same sum Libya paid for the incident. While in some circles that was described as the coup de grace of the idea of an independent Libyan judiciary, zealously touted to anyone who objected to the case, this view is too cynical to be true. Right?

I’m not going to say “imagine if the medics were from country so-and-so”. They are citizens of small, poor, and relatively unimportant countries, one Arab and five Eastern Europeans. This should not matter – but, by the looks of it, it matters a lot. It matters enough that during the course of these processes, which I consider and will consider the greatest travesty of justice since probably the “justice” of Khmer Rouge Cambodia, Libya scored its greatest diplomatic successes.

Yes, everyone: during the course of these processes, Libya normalized its relations with the US and most European countries. Seven years ago, it was international pariah. Now it is not, and it will soon reap the economic benefits of the “thaw” in its relations with the West. After all, it has renounced its nuclear program, it has compensated the victims of Lockerby, and no longer uses terrorism. Well, not against the wrong people, at least. Even including the compensations paid, it’s a diplomatic marvel that puts the extortion of one poor state and one semi-state to shame. Now, everyone feels like they can work with Libya. It’s a valuable partner in the unstable situation in the Mediterranean, and an important bulwark against illegal immigration. Yes, everyone likes Libya.

Okay, not exactly likes. US and EU officials have protested the death sentences, and they say that they expect the verdicts to be overturned. They are worried, and anxious, and concerned. After all, we are in an age of human rights, transnational cooperation, and new values. We are in an age of cultural struggle dominated by morality, in an age that has rejected the savage tactics of the previous ages and tries to eliminate them from the face of the planet, whether they be terrorism, fundamentalism, torture, religious persecution, oppression, or cruelty.

Yet Libya is a valuable partner. At least, no one wants to have it as an enemy.

Apparently, it’s too much bother.


In the most recent development that I know of, the medics are charged with defamation of the public authorities. They are also tried of, notwithstanding the main accusation, of immoral behavior (the nurses, I am not sure about the doctor), consumption and illegal production of alcohol (the nurses), and various other misdemeanors.

[ January 31, 2007, 14:57: Message edited by: The Shaman ]