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Hijack law overturned

Berlin: Germany's highest court on Wednesday struck down a law that would have allowed the Government to shoot down hijacked airliners as a last resort in a terrorist attack. President Horst Koehler signed the air safety bill into law last year, but encouraged a review by the Federal Constitutional Court amid heated debate over whether the state has a right to kill citizens even to save the lives of others. In its ruling on a complaint filed by a group of lawyers and a flight captain, the court found the bill ``incompatible with the fundamental right to life and with the guarantee of human dignity'' for innocent passengers on an aircraft. It also found that allowing the military to shoot down civilian airliners violates a constitutional bar on the military being deployed for domestic security — except in natural disasters or after a particularly serious accident has happened. — AP

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