Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi's son, Saif al-Islam, will visit Bulgaria after the trial of the six Bulgarian medics is over, al-Islamannounced in Paris last Wednesday.

"I like Bulgaria very much, I have many friends there," al-Islam said. He said he has met Prime Minister Simeon Saxe-Coburg and is on excellent terms with Foreign Minister Solomon Passi and Parliamentary Speaker Ognian Gerdjikov.

Passi has kept in constant contact with al-Islam over the past six months and had a one-on-one conference with him and al-Islam's father Muammar Gaddafi when he visited Tripoli last December.

Al-Islam is the chairman of the Gaddafi International Foundation for Charity Associations, which took up the role of independent observer of the trial in September last year.

The Bulgarian medics were charged with deliberately infecting 393 Libyan children with HIV in a Benghazi hospital. They have spent nearly three years in prison under difficult conditions.

Thanks to the intervention of al-Islam's foundation, the Bulgarians were moved from the Tripoli prison Djudeida to house arrest in a villa on February 4.

At the medics' most recent hearing, the heaviest indictment, of conspiracy against the Jamahiriya's national security, was quashed.

"We are of the opinion that the preliminary investigation was not conducted properly," al-Islam said last Tuesday in an interview for the Arab newspaper Ash Sharq al-Lusat.

Encouraged by his father, al-Islam carried out an independent investigation on the case. He said that the accusations were not based on a conspiracy, but were much more a matter of negligence. To support this stance, al-Islam has gathered evidence, witnesses and concrete details through his foundation.

About two weeks ago, al-Islam confirmed that the Bulgarian medics had been under pressure to confess their involvement in the case. He said those who tortured the medics during interrogations would be detained and brought before the Libyan Court.

"I express warm thanks to Saif al-Islam, the head of the Gaddafi International Foundation for Charity Associations, who served as an impartial observer in the trial," Bulgarian President Georgi Purvanov said on February 18.

"I'll be glad to welcome Saif al-Islam as a guest of mine in Bulgaria," Purvanov also said.

According to information published in Dnevnik daily last Wednesday, the Bulgarian foundation For Our Children and the national workers trade union with LUKoil Neftochim Bourgas have jointly extended an invitation to al-Islam to visit Bulgaria.