The Tokyo High Court on Tuesday upheld a lower court ruling and rejected compensation claims from four Chinese people who were injured and one whose relative died from being exposed to chemical weapons abandoned by Japan in China at the end of the war.

Presiding Judge Hiromitsu Okita said the Japanese government was not liable for death or injury from the weapons, saying it could not have conducted a proper search for weapons in another country.

The plaintiffs had sought a combined 80 million yen from the Japanese government.