The Dutch state is responsible for executions committed by colonial troops at an Indonesian village in 1947 and relatives of victims should be compensated, a Dutch court ruled Wednesday.
"This court finds that the (Dutch) state acted wrongly through these executions and that the state is liable to pay damages in terms of the law," judge Daphne Schreuder said in The Hague.
Eight widows and one survivor from the town of Rawagedeh east of Jakarta took the Dutch state to court in 2008 to claim compensation for the execution of men and boys on December 9, 1947 by Dutch colonial troops, during Indonesia's war of independence.
A three-judge bench of The Hague civil court ruled Wednesday that seven of the eight widows claiming compensation should receive it, while the family of a survivor of the massacre should also be compensated. The survivor, named as Saih Bin Sakam, died at age 88 in May this year.
An eighth widow died before the court papers were formally lodged in 2008, Schreuder said, turning down that claim.
A hearing to determine the exact amount to be paid would be the next step, the group's delighted lawyer Liesbeth Zegveld said.
The Netherlands has in the past admitted that the execution did indeed take place, but argued that no claim could be lodged because of an expiry in the statute of limitations in Dutch law of five years, the court heard.
Although the Dutch government in the past expressed "deep regret" over the conduct of some of its troops in pre-independence Indonesia, it has never formally apologised for any excesses including the massacre at Rawagedeh.
The judge ruled that "The state's argument that the case has expired based on the statute of limitations and of reasonableness and fairness is unacceptable."
"This is a highly unusual case, for which in the Netherlands there was no precedent," she said.
Zegveld commented: "This means that the state can't just sit in silence for 60 years waiting for the case to go away or the plaintiffs to die and then appeal to the statute of limitations."
"The state has been rapped over the knuckles," she said.
Authorities in the Netherlands say 150 people died while a victims' association claims 431 lost their lives during an operation to root out a suspected independence fighter hiding in the village, known today as Balongsari.
None of the soldiers involved in the shooting was ever prosecuted, Schreuder said, and neither have the victims' families ever been told of any investigations.
In reaction to the judgement, the Dutch state's advocate Bert-Jan Houtzagers said it would be studied.
"We will look at it first before making any statements," he told AFP.
The Dutch government in 2009 decided to donate 850,000 euros to the area of Balongsari, but has avoided using the term "compensation", Dutch daily newspaper De Volkskrant reported.
The paper said however that it lost track of the money after it was paid over to Indonesian authorities and that little development had taken place so far in the village.
Indonesia's former colonial masters, the Dutch colonised the Asian country from the early 17th century. Indonesia gained independence in 1949.
In another case, Dutch appeals court judges on July 5 this year ruled the state responsible for the deaths of three Muslims at the fall of Srebrenica in eastern Bosnia in 1995, following an application by survivors and their relatives.
The court of appeal's ruling marked the first time the Dutch state has been held responsible for the actions of its UN peacekeeping battalion which was charged with protecting thousands of Muslims from a Bosnian Serb offensive and the case opened the way for compensation claims.
