The Dutch state will not pay compensation to a survivor and nine family members of Indonesians in the village of Rawagede who were massacred by Dutch soldiers 60 years ago because the case is too old, reports the NRC.

Indonesia, a former Dutch colony, was granted sovereignty in 1949 after an armed struggle.
In an incident during the five years of guerrilla warfare before Indonesia won its independence, Dutch soldiers executed a group of around 431 men and boys in the West Java village of Rawagede on December 9, 1947.
In a civil case started against the Dutch state in September, a survivor and nine widows of those killed in Rawagede demanded an official apology and damages but the Dutch attorney general has rejected the claim, the paper says.
Moderately positive
In a letter to their lawyers on Monday, the attorney general said the claim has been rejected because: ‘the state does not have information about the individual circumstances and the fate of widows and other family members of the clients.’ Instead the state has offered to discuss the situation with the claimants.
Their attorney, Liesbeth Zegveld, told AP news service on Monday that she was surprised by the ruling. ‘I am surprised they dare to invoke this,’ she said referring to the statute in which a time limit is specified for compensation claims.’I find it unreasonable,’ she added.
Zegveld is ‘moderately positive’ with this offer and will wait until talks have taken place before deciding whether to continue with legal action, reports the NRC.
The attorney general referred to an official Dutch government document from 1969 which admitted that ‘a large number of Indonesian men taken as prisoners were executed by the Dutch military without due process’. The document estimates the number of men killed at Rawagede (now called Balongsari) at 150.
The military action at Rawagede was aimed at resistance fighters who were supposed to be hiding in the village but it emerged later that those killed had not been fighters.
The attorney general told the survivor of the massacre and family members of those killed that the state ‘very much’ regretted the executions.
Foreign ministry spokesman Aad Meijer told AP that following an official apology in 2005 by the Dutch government, ‘a line was drawn by both countries under this painful part of their shared history’.
Meijer said the Dutch ambassador to Indonesia will attend a memorial service in Rawagedeh, about 60 kilometers (40 miles) east of the capital, Jakarta on December 9. It will be the first time such a senior Dutch diplomat has attended the annual memorial event, says AP.