Press release

Pending sentences of 7 defendants in an unfair trial
in Libya

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SOFIA, 12 September 2001 - Bulgarian Helsinki Committee (BHC) is concerned about the human rights violations of the due process and use of torture against 7 defendants in a trial that is taking place in Tripoli, Libya. BHC is a Bulgarian human rights organization, which monitors the human rights situation in the country and provides legal defense in cases of human rights abuses, is concerned about the outcome of the trial in Libya against six Bulgarian medical professionals charged with infecting 393 children with HIV. On 22 September 2001 the People's Court in Tripoli will pronounce the verdict. If convicted the Bulgarians may face the death penalty.

BHC followed the case from its very beginning. We received information from the relatives of the accused, from the latter's colleagues who returned from Libya and from the Bulgarian media correspondents to Tripoli who covered the trial.

BHC concerns are heightened by the fact that the defendants are alleged to have been tortured and that there have been serious irregularities in their pre-trial and trial proceedings.

The facts of the case are as follows: on 9 February 1999 more than seventy health professionals from Bulgaria (23 of them), the Philippines, Egypt, Poland and Hungary were arrested in Benghazi, northeast of Tripoli. The arrests followed a several month investigation into the reasons that led to HIV epidemics at the Al-Fateh Pediatric Hospital in the city. Reportedly almost 400 children were infected with HIV and at least 23 have died.

One day after the arrest all foreign health professionals were set free except the 23 Bulgarians. The latter were transported to Tripoli for further police investigations. Seven days later 17 Bulgarians were released. The five who remained under arrest were female nurses. Their names are Christina Vulcheva, Nassya Nenova, Valentina Siropulo, Valya Chervenyashka and Snejana Dimitrova.

On 9 February 1999 Mrs. Christina Vulcheva's husband, Dr. Zdravko Georgiev, a Bulgarian national, was also arrested when he went to seek his wife in the police office. Dr. Georgiev was detained and accused with the five other Bulgarians although he did not work in the same Pediatric Hospital.

On 7 February 2000 a Tripoli prosecutor signed a 1,600-page indictment against the six Bulgarians, nine Libyans and one Palestinian on numerous charges in relation to the mass HIV infection in Benghazi. The charges include undermining and attacking the security of the Libyan State by spreading HIV intentionally via contaminated blood products, through transfusion and injection. Specific charges against the foreign nationals include: intentional killing with a lethal substance (Article 371 of the Libyan Criminal Code), random killing with the aim of attacking the security of the State (Article 202 of the Libyan Criminal Code) and causing an epidemic through spreading harmful microbes leading to the death of persons (Article 305 of the Libyan Criminal Code). If convicted, the defendants may face the death penalty. Other charges have been brought against the Bulgarians and Palestinian defendants for violating the norms relating to the Islamic way of life in the Libyan Arab Jamahirya. Charges of this type, leveled against the Bulgarian female nurses, include extramarital sexual activity and the production and possession of alcohol. The Palestinian defendant faces a charge of exchanging money through the black market. The Libyan nationals in the case have been charged with numerous counts of negligence in their capacity as health officials, as well as abuse of authority.

Since their arrest on 9 February 1999 the accused have remained in custody. At first they were kept incommunicado detention for about 10 months without access to their families. They were allowed access to a defense lawyer only after trail proceedings had begun. In the mid-May 2000 the Libyan defense lawyer for the Bulgarian defendants, Osman Bizanti, hired by the Bulgarian Embassy told the media that he had only met his clients on two occasions. In August 2000, a Bulgarian attorney, Vladimir Sheitanov, joined the defense. However, he had been hampered by his ignorance both of the Arabic language and of the Libyan legal system as well as of long awaited access to the case file.

The trial was postponed 13 times by the judge upon request from defense. The last court hearing was held on 16 June 2001. The court is expected to pronounce its verdict on 22 September 2001.

Concerns about torture and inhuman treatment

All defendants have complained that during the initial stage of detention they were subjected to torture and inhuman treatment. At first the accused told Mr. Hristo Danov, the Bulgarian president's envoy, who visited them in the prison in April 2000, that during the investigation they were tortured. Before the court hearing on 12 May 2001 Mrs. Krisrtina Vulcheva told the Bulgarian 24hours newspaper correspondent that all the detainees were subjected to systematic torture during the first three months after the arrest. Later the information was confirmed by Mr. Emil Manolov, the Bulgaria's consul general in Tripoli, who visited the detainees on 31 May 2001 for the first time in three months.

Two of the accused - Mrs. Kristina Vulcheva and Mrs. Nassya Nenova, - who seemed to have suffered most, raised their complaints of torture during the court hearing on 2 June 2001 while questioned as to confessions they made during the investigation. Both accused withdrew their testimonies with the explanation that they were coerced by torture to confess offenses they had not committed. Mrs. Vulcheva said that during the investigation she was subjected at least ten times to electric shocks at night. She was undressed and beaten with an electric cable. This allegation of torture was later confirmed by Mrs. Vulcheva's mother, Zorka Anachkova. She visited her daughter in the prison after the last court hearing on 17 June 2001. Mrs. Anachkova told the Bulgarian "Trud" newspaper of 8 August 2001 that her daughter accounted of torture. Christina Vulcheva was undressed and subjected to electric shocks. Then two men held her under arms and made her run while her legs was still paralyzed by the electricity. For nine months after the torture Mrs. Vulcheva did not have menstruation.

At the court hearing on 2 June 2001 Mrs. Nenova told the court that she was systematically tortured and subjected to electric shocks during the detention. She attempted a suicide when she heard that Major Djuma who conducted the torture returned to the prison to take over the investigation. She also accounted that before and after the court hearings all detainees were always taken to the investigation's office where investigators exerted pressure upon them. Mrs. Nenova allegations were confirmed in the mid June 2000 by Mrs. Nadya Dervisheva, a Bulgarian nurse who was arrested with the accused but later released without being prosecuted. She told the BHC that Nassya Nenova acknowledged to her in the prison that she had been tortured. Mrs. Dervisheva observed her limping due to her mistreatment: the detainee needed prison staff to help her walk. On 13 July 2001 Dr. Ivan Nenov, husband of Nassya Nenova, visited his wife during in the prison. He told the Bulgarian 24 hours newspaper that Mrs. Nenova accounted that she was beaten with a cable on her hands and feet. As a result she could not walk for one week. A month later she was subjected to electric shocks and threatened to be infected with HIV if did not make confessions.

The Palestinian detainee was allowed to be visited by his family in early 2000. They later reported to Human Rights Watch staff in New York that they observed "black marks" on his hands. He told them he had been subjected to electric shock.

At the court hearing on 16 June 2001 the Bulgarian attorney Sheitanov requested the Court to order a forensic expertise to determine whether the detainees were tortured. He also gave a list of the people who conducted torture. The court did not answer to the request.

Bulgarian Helsinki Committee recalls that in all circumstances torture and cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment is outlawed by intentional law. Article 5 of the UDHR states: "No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment". Similar words appear in international treaties, including the Convention against Torture and Article 7 of the ICCPR.

Concerns about unfair trial

Bulgarian Helsinki Committee expresses its concern about some procedural irregularities which demonstrated unfair application of justice. The right to fair trial is guaranteed by Article 14 of the ICCPR. It was violated on by reason of the following:

Refusal of the court to allow defense to bring in expert medical testimonies

The defense lawyers for the Bulgarian defendants requested the court to summon as witnesses Dr. Lucke Montagnier from France, who discovered the HIV virus and Dr. Lucke Rerrin from Switzerland, who is one of the most prominent HIV researchers to appear before it as medical expert. The two professors ran check ups on some of the Libyan children and found that most of them were also infected with different types of hepatitis B and C. According to them this fact speaks of multiple-source of infection in the Benghazi hospital. The court refused to grant the request.

Admissibility of statements extracted under torture

Under Libyan law, any of the suspects who confess would be sentenced to death. This is in violation of the rule of inadmissibility of statements extracted under torture. Article 15 of the Convention against Torture states: "Each State Party shall ensure that any statement which is established to have been made as a result of torture shall not be invoked as evidence in any proceedings, except against a person accused of torture as evidence that the statement was made." Article 14 (3) (g) of the ICCPR also forbids the compelling of defendants to testify or confess guilt.

Violation of the presumption of innocence

On 27 April 2001 Colonel al-Gaddafi delivered a speech at the African summit on AIDS/HIV, Tuberculosis and other related Infectious Diseases Prevention in Abudja, Nigeria, widely covered in the media. He said the CIA created the HIV virus, Western pharmaceutical companies profit from it and the Bulgarians gave it to Libyan children perhaps at the behest of U.S. or Israeli intelligence services. "Who charged them with this odious task?" Gaddafi said in remarks to the summit that were broadcast live on Libyan television and translated by the BBC Worldwide Monitoring Service. "Some said it was the CIA. Others said it was the Mossad (Israeli intelligence). They carried out an experiment on these children." Gaddafi also said that he wished the trial turned into "an international trial, similar to the Lockerbie trial".

Independence of the judiciary

The defendants are tried in a special court, the People's Court. Although the members of the court are said to be independent and responsible only to the law and their conscience they are not explicitly required to be members of the judiciary or trained lawyers. In addition they are elected by the General People's Congress on a periodic basis. These two particularities of the court appear to be inconsistent with the Basic Principles on the Independence of the Judiciary adopted by the 7th UN Congress on the prevention of Crime and the treatment of Officers, in September 1985 and approved by the 40th Session of the UN General Assembly in November 1985. The court is set up to examine political offenses along with prosecutor's notions for prohibition of party activities, crimes concerning the protection of the revolution and economic crimes.top

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