US judge may dismiss apartheid lawsuit

[dArKeR]

New York - If victims of apartheid had a case against companies dealing with the apartheid state, then electrical companies could be sued for their part in deaths on the electric chair, a judge argued this week.

Judge John Sprizzo was considering three lawsuits brought by 91 apartheid victims and Khulumani, a human rights group, against several major corporations that did business in apartheid South Africa, including ExxonMobil, Shell Oil, Royal Dutch Petroleum, Citigroup, JP Morgan Chase, UBS, Ford and DaimlerChrysler.

The suits seek to follow the precedent of litigation won by Holocaust victims against corporations that collaborated with the Nazis.

'Their motivation was to make a buck'
The hearing this week promised to centre on arcane points of law in courtroom 705 in the United States district court in lower Manhattan. Instead, constant interruptions by the sceptical judge provided some entertainment - if not always for the supporters of apartheid reparations packing the court.

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