Mick Hartley

The story of the Benghazi Six drags on:

Libya’s Supreme Court has upheld the death sentences imposed in 2004 on six Bulgarian nurses and a Palestinian doctor for infecting children with HIV.

However, a mediating body – the Gaddafi Foundation – has reportedly agreed a financial settlement with the children’s families.

This could see the death penalties overturned by Libya’s High Judicial Council at a later date.

No mention – of course – of the recent developments in the Lockerbie affair, where fresh doubts have been raised over the conviction of the Libyan intelligence officer originally charged. Which was timely:

Libya made it known that it would exchange the six defendants for Abdel Basset Ali al-Megrahi, a Libyan intelligence officer who was convicted in the Lockerbie trial of bombing Pan Am Flight 103. Indeed, the six were charged on March 7, 1999, just a month before April 5, 1999 when Libya handed over al-Megrahi. On April 11, 2007 Libya declared it was no longer interested in the exchange but that blood money would still have to be paid.

Bulgaria has maintained that it would never pay out blood money, which would amount to an admission of guilt. On the other hand, Libyan officials have been ramping up the rhetoric. It’ll be interesting to see what happens. For the poor defendants meanwhile, scapegoated over an HIV outbreak they couldn’t possibly have caused, tortured to extract their confessions, and still under sentence of death, the ordeal continues.