German court rejects Serb claim for NATO attack

BERLIN, Nov 2 (Reuters) Germany's highest court of appeals today rejected a claim by a group of Serbs demanding compensation from Germany for 1999 NATO air strikes which killed 10 Serbian villagers and injured 30.

The court said the law made no provision for compensation between a state and individual people, only between states.

It also noted German fighter planes did not take part in the attack.

''There is no breach of conduct by German soldiers or authorities because German planes were not directly involved in the attack,'' said the court in a statement.

The attack took place on May 30, 1999 in the village of Varvarin in central Serbia. NATO bombers struck a bridge over the river Morava while local people celebrated an Orthodox Christian holiday.

Most people were killed in a second strike which occurred a few minutes later while they were trying to give first aid to victims of the initial attack.

In 1999, NATO operations drove Serb forces out of Kosovo, a part of Serbia with a mostly ethnic Albanian population.

The 35 Serbs bringing the case against NATO-member Germany and together seeking about 530,000 euros (5,000) argued the country could have used its veto against NATO attacks on what was a civilian target with no military significance.

Unable to take action against NATO as a whole, they brought the case against Germany mainly because it was where they found financial backing, a campaigner said.

''This is a case against Germany in the sense that it is a member of NATO. We wanted to bring a case in the United States but could not find the money to do so,'' Gordana Milanovic of the NATO-War Victims Claim Compensation Project told Reuters.

She said interest in Germany was aroused by a report by human rights group Amnesty International which in 2000 criticised NATO for failing to suspend the attack on the Varvarin bridge after it was evident they had hit civilians.

A plaintiff lawyer told Reuters it was unclear whether the group of Serbs would take further action.

''We do not exclude the possibility that we will take this further -- it would go next to the Constitutional Court -- but it is too early to say yet,'' lawyer Joachim Kummer told Reuters.

Lower courts in Bonn and Cologne had previously rejected the lawsuit.

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