Photo Gallery HIV Medics Released
The ordeal is over. The five Bulgarian nurses and Palestinian doctor held in a Libyan jail for eight years were finally released on Tuesday morning.
They were flown out of Libya in the French presidential plane in the early hours of Tuesday morning and arrived in Sofia just before 10 a.m. local time. As soon as they arrived they were pardoned by Bulgarian President Georgi Parvanov.
The six medics were arrested in 1999 and charged with infecting over 400 children with HIV while they were working at Benghazi hospital. They were sentenced to death, but Libya's High Judicial Council commuted their sentences to life imprisonment last week.
Valentina Manolova Siropulo is greeted by relatives shortly after arriving home in Bulgaria.
Palestinian doctor Ashraf al-Hazouz was granted Bulgarian citizenship in June so that he would benefit from any transfer deal.
European Union External Affairs Commissioner Benita Ferrero-Waldner and Cecilia Sarkozy, wife of French President Nicolas Sarkozy, were also on board. They had met with Libyan officials over the past few days to help secure the release of the six medics.
Bulgarian doctor Zdravko Georgiev was the only person to be acquitted in the HIV trial. He is the husband of one of the released nurses, Christiana Valcheva.
President Nicolas Sarkozy told a news conference in Paris that he would visit Libya with his Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner on Wednesday.
