News / Germany

South American families of Germanwings crash seek damages

Sunday, 07 May 2017 2:47 PM [ Last Update: Sunday, 07 May 2017 3:14 PM ]

German relatives and friends of victims speak to journalists after laying down candles following the commemoration ceremonies at the Vernet memorial, southeastern France, on March 24, 2017 to mark the second anniversary of the Germanwings tragedy. (Photo by AFP)

Two years after the Germanwings plane crash, relatives of the South American victims have filed suit in Germany seeking over three million euros in damages, a judicial source says.

The Duesseldorf civil court has received two cases seeking compensation of "more than three million euros" ($3.3 million) from the German subsidiary of Lufthansa, a spokesman told national news agency DPA.

According to German daily Bild, the lawsuits were filed by three Paraguayan plaintiffs.

None of the nine South American victims had Paraguayan nationality but an Argentinian businessman had been living in the country.

Germanwings copilot Andreas Lubitz deliberately flew the plane into a mountainside in the French Alps in March 2015, killing 149 people.

It later emerged that he had been treated for mental health problems in the months before the disaster.

In January, German prosecutors closed a criminal investigation into the crash after concluding that Lubitz alone was responsible and without pressing negligence charges against the airline or the doctors who had examined him.

But many relatives of the victims were unhappy with the outcome.

In March last year, two lawyers representing 73 victims filed a case in the United States against the pilot school that trained Lubitz.

After the crash, the airline said it would pay 50,000 euros in emergency aid to the families of all the victims, as well as 35,000 euros to parents of the Germans killed - as required by German law.

(Source: AFP)

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