US President George W. Bush said yesterday it was a high priority for the United States to win the release of five Bulgarian nurses sentenced to death in Libya for infecting children with HIV.

 

Ending an eight-day European tour in Bulgaria, Bush also called for an exchange of information with Russia on the planned US missile defense shield in central Europe and said he regretted the collapse of an immigration bill back home.

 

"We strongly support the release of the Bulgarian nurses in Libya," Bush told a news conference in Sofia. "It's a high priority for our country."

 

"Together with the EU, the United States is contributing to a fund to provide assistance to the Libyan children suffering from this disease (HIV/AIDS) and to their families."

 

Bulgarians have expressed hope that Bush's intervention would provide the final push to help bring home the five nurses and a Palestinian doctor who were convicted in December of deliberately infecting 426 children with HIV.

 

Their highly politicized trial has hampered attempts by OPEC member Libya to restore full relations with the West.

 

In Tripoli, EU Commissioner for External Relations Benita Ferrero-Waldner said she saw "a window of opportunity" for the release of the six medics, in jail since 1999. They say they are innocent and were tortured to make them confess.

 

Bush flew home from Sofia yesterday afternoon, having visited the Czech Republic, Germany, Poland, Italy, the Vatican, Albania and Bulgaria.

 

In Sofia, Bush shook hands and chatted with a group of Bulgarians in central Nevski Square, but there was no outpouring of affection he encountered in Albania on Sunday.

 

During the European trip Bush sought to bolster ties with Western leaders at a G8 summit, but the trip was dogged by US-Russian tensions, exacerbated by planned US missile defense bases in Poland and the Czech Republic.

 

(China Daily June 12, 2007)