An Egyptian court has convicted five men on charges of homosexual behaviour and sentenced them to three years in prison followed by three years of close police supervision, according to a judicial official and a defence lawyer. Four of the men had tested HIV-positive after they were forced to undergo blood tests while in custody, reports the Associated Press. More than 100 human rights groups have slammed the trial as driven by ignorance and fear of AIDS, and have warned that it could undermine HIV/AIDS prevention efforts in Egypt. The verdicts are the latest in recent arrests and trials in Egypt of HIV-positive men that human rights groups say serve to criminalize AIDS in this country. In mid-January, four other HIV-positive men were sentenced to one-year prison terms on similar charges. A defence lawyer for the five, Adel Ramadan, said the judge convicted the men for the 'habitual practice of debauchery', a term used in the Egyptian legal system to denote consensual homosexual acts. Ramadan, from the Cairo-based Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights, said the men were arrested, abused and tortured over the past seven months. He said they were verbally insulted and beaten by police officers wearing gloves who sought to 'extract confessions' of homosexuality from them. The full Associated Press story is available on the link below.