French president Nicolas Sarkozy said that he did not regret the role France played in the liberation of the six Bulgarian medics accused of deliberate HIV infection in Libya.

Sarkozy’s statement was made during a ceremony commemorating the 18th anniversary of an air-plane attack in Nigeria, in which 54 Frenchmen died, Bulgarian National Radio (BNR) reported. Six Libyans were sentenced in absentia for the attack.

During my pre-election campaign I said that I will go to collect the Bulgarian nurses and I have no regrets that is exactly what happened, Sarkozy said.

After spending eight years and a half in prison, someone had to go and take these poor people home. It is an honour for France that it achieved that and I do not owe apologies, French president said as quoted by Agence France-Presse.

Sarkozy said that he assumed the six Bulgarian medics were French.