Tripoli 6 sentenced to death

Hopefully something will happen and these innocent health workers will get to leave Libya alive and in one piece.

Welcome to the future of the US, if the religious idiots have their way.

Welcome to the future of the US, if the religious idiots have their way.

As much as it is tempting to snarkily frame this as a court victory for anti-evolution forces, the situation is too serious.

— Andrea Bottaro

Apparently:

"Libya says that it will not bow to international pressure over death sentences passed on five Bulgarian nurses and a Palestinian doctor."

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/6194325.stm

The verdict, which will be automatically referred to Libya's Supreme Court, drew quick condemnation from European nations, which have charged that the five Bulgarian nurses and a Palestinian doctor were being made scapegoats. A Western medical study, released too late for the trial, said the infections occurred before the medical workers came to Libya. The United States and European Union had called for the release of the defendants, warning that the case would affect Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi's effort to repair his rogue image and rebuild ties with the West. But Libyans strongly supported a conviction. A few dozen relatives of infected children --- about 50 of whom have died of AIDS --- waited outside the court holding poster-sized pictures of their children and placards reading "Death for the children killers" and " HIV made in Bulgaria." After the verdict, the crowd chanted "Execution! Execution!" "God is great!" yelled Ibrahim Mohammed al-Aurabi, the father of an infected child, as soon as the presiding judge finished reading the verdict. "Long live the Libyan judiciary!" The nurses and doctor have been in jail since 1999 on charges that they intentionally spread the AIDS virus to more than 400 children at a hospital in the city of Benghazi during a botched experiment to find a cure for the disease. Western nations blame the infections on unsanitary conditions at Libyan hospitals and accuse Tripoli of using the six workers as scapegoats. Bulgaria and the EU swiftly condemned the verdict. "Sentencing innocent people to death is an attempt to cover up the real culprits and the real reasons for the AIDS outbreak in Benghazi," Bulgaria's parliament speaker, Georgi Pirinski, said in the capital, Sofia.

I saw an Amnesty International spokesman say that the court refused to allow important scientific evidence to be heard. This is a stronger version of the story than "ignore". So, I'll be interested to find out just why the court refused to hear the evidence. Was it because scientific evidence of any kind had the potential to unambiguously expose a preposterous verdict or was it because they knew the evidence was coming from evolution science? Either way, it's an outrage. But, I wonder if we'll ever know for sure. If the judges were afraid of a religious backlash if evolution based science were allowed in court, it's hard to see how this verdict is going to be overturned. If Bulgaria can pull off a commando raid to get these people out, I'm all for it. I've no interest in appeasing cults any further: they're a menace to civilization. If the EU and the U.S. do nothing to punish Libya for this disgusting episode, we should be ashamed.

According to a CNN story, Condoleezza Rice said the United States is
"very disappointed with the outcome". An EU spokesman "condemned" the verdict. The State Dept. should have expressed some form of moral outrage. And, for not doing so, I condemn the State Dept.

They won't waste any time executing these innocents to salve the rage of the muslim morons. Time to lend the Bulgarians a couple of Seal Teams to bring them out.

It's not only that in any given human population there is a surfeit of those who take it upon themselves to explain the mysteries of existence. It is also, and the more sorrowful, that there are exponentially more who will nod sagely and agree. Two hyperbolic ingredients that irritate the faithful to the point that they will do harm to the infidel from over the hill.

I guess if you couple widespread ignorance of contemporary knowledge, iron-handed state rule, the sense that "we Lybians have only begun so save (read "mimic") face and must insist that we speak truly," with the notion that science is merely another political tool like someone else's life, you can expect this sort of thing. Another entry into the log of things we should have learned to avoid.

The good news is that such people become somewhat more predictable than your basic infidel . . .

I'm sorry, it's "Libyans."

Libya's second-largest city, Benghazi has been a center for anti-Gadhafi Islamic fundamentalist groups in the past and an innocent verdict could fuel opposition to the government -- particularly if conditions at the hospital were to blame for the infections.

As far as the content of the letters, besides expressing outrage, I am not sure what specific actions we could ask for. I would hate to see the Lybian people punished for their government's heavy-handedness, and I don't believe in the effectiveness of bullying measures.

I think the Bulgarians should have accepted Gadhafi's offer for the families of the victims to be compensated, and be done with it. Heck, we could start a fund, give them all the money they need, just let the damn medics go! Proving their innocence in a Lybian court is irrelevant if the court refuses to see relevant evidence is a matter of silly pride.

"It is true however, that this is the kind of thing that can be expected when scientific evidence is disregarded for politically opportunistic reasons"

my 1st rxn ..omigod

this IS what happens when ideology trumps science ..people die ...they unfortunately will not be the first (lysenkoism)......hopefully the more honest of the religious will demand that they be freed .....