Libya's Supreme Judicial Council (SJC) has commuted the death verdicts of five Bulgarian nurses and a Palestinian doctor to life imprisonment, Bulgarian media reported on late Tuesday.

The six medics, who have been under arrest since 1999, were sentenced to death for deliberately causing an HIV outbreak at a Benghazi hospital and infecting 426 children with the virus.

The death sentence was reconfirmed by the Libyan Supreme Court last Wednesday and the case was then delivered to the SJC, which has the right of final say - to overthrow, to reconfirm or to commute the verdict.

The final ruling came hours after relatives of the HIV-infected children dropped their demands for execution of the medics after all of them received their compensations under a deal that was expected to lead to their freedom.

The compensation is worthy of US$1 million for each child, media revealed.

The paper was one of two key documents that should guarantee the end of the 8 year-long trial. The other one is paperwork petitioning for pardon that was signed by the medics over the weekend.

Having known the new decision of Libya, Bulgarian lawyers become optimistic on the final freedom of the medics. According to a bilateral judicial agreement signed in 1980s between Bulgaria and Libya, the Bulgarian medics could be transferred to Bulgaria to serve their sentence.

Bulgaria's top Procurator will officially ask the Libyan authority to transfer the medics today.

(Xinhua News Agency July 18, 2007)