Bush urges Libya to release Bulgarian nurses sentenced to death in AIDS case News
Bush urges Libya to release Bulgarian nurses sentenced to death in AIDS case

[JURIST] In a White House meeting Monday with visiting Bulgarian President Georgi Parvanov [official profile], President Bush urged the Libyan government to release five Bulgarian nurses sentenced to death for intentionally causing an AIDS outbreak at a Benghazi children's hospital in 1999. The story made international headlines last year when the court deciding the case seemingly ignored testimony from several expert witnesses [BBC report] that the outbreak occurred prior to the arrival of the health professionals. During his meeting [White House transcript] with Parvanov, Bush said "the nurses ought to be not only spared their [lives], but [should be released from] prison." Earlier this year, a Libyan court acquitted nine police officers and one doctor [JURIST report] in the case. Reuters has more.

THIS DAY @ LAW

UN General Assembly approves Palestine partition plan

The UN General Assembly approved UN Resolution Resolution 181 (II) on November 29, 1947, recommending that the British Mandate for Palestine be split into a Jewish state, an Arab state, and an international zone for Jerusalem. The vote in the assembly was 33 for to 13 against, with 10 abstentions. The resolution sparked a war between Palestinian Arabs and Jews in 1947 and a wider war after Egypt, Syria, Jordan, Iraq, and Lebanon invaded the new State of Israel in 1948. Read Resolution 181 (II).

UN divided Palestine between Arabs and Jews

On November 29, 1947, the UN General Assembly voted to partition Palestine into Jewish and Arab territories, leading to the establishment of a Jewish state the following year. Read UN General Assembly Resolution 181.

Defense Secretary Robert McNamara resigns during Vietnam Conflict

On November 29, 1967, Secretary of Defense Robert S. McNamara announced that he was resigning from his office to accept an appointment as head of the World Bank. The announcement came as the Vietnam Conflict was becoming increasingly unpopular in the United States and abroad.