LIBYA:The six medical workers imprisoned on charges of infecting children with the HIV virus were tortured by electric shock during their captivity, the son of Libyan leader Muammar Gadafy has told al-Jazeera television.
The Palestinian-born doctor and five Bulgarian nurses were released last month after eight years in prison. Several have described ordeals of electric shock, rape and attacks by dogs.
"Yes, they were tortured by electricity and they were threatened that their family members would be targeted," Saif al-Islam Gadafy is quoted as saying on the Arab broadcaster's website.
Although Gadafy confirmed the electric shocks, he disputed other allegations of torture, some made by Ashraf al-Hazouz (38), a Palestinian-born doctor who was among the imprisoned medical workers. Dr al-Hazouz has said in interviews, "we were treated like animals".
He told Dutch television that Libyans had attached electrodes to his genitals and feet, sent dogs to attack him and tied his limbs to a metal bar, spinning him "like a chicken on a rotisserie".
Electric shock torture, sleep deprivation and beatings drove one of the nurses to try to kill herself about two months after her arrest by gnawing the veins in her wrists, according to an account her mother gave the Bulgarian newspaper Standard.
President Gadafy's eldest son often acts as a public relations and diplomatic spokesman for his father and reportedly was instrumental in negotiations with the West in convincing his father to give up Libyan nuclear ambitions.
He is reported to have played a role in orchestrating the deal to release the medical workers. A painter who attended the London School of Economics, the oldest Gadafy son frequently has been named as potential successor to his father. He has insisted, however, that Libya's next leader will be democratically elected.
The statement on torture was the second time that the younger Gadafy has exposed controversial details of the case.
Several days after the Libyan government turned the workers over to the EU and French officials, he told Le Monde that the French government approved a $230 million anti-tank missile sale to Libya, in part as a result of the prison release. The French government insists the issues were not connected. -