AFP via defense-aerospace: An Iraqi shepherd is seeking 200 million dollars in damages from the US military for the deaths of 17 members of his family as well as 200 sheep in a missile strike, in the first such suit filed through the courts of the US-led occupation administration.

"The trial will be Iraq's first against US troops because we believe they used excessive force against the Iraqi people who cooperated with the United States to topple Saddam Hussein's regime," Abud Sarhan's lawyer told AFP. Lawyer Rabah al-Alwani was approached by Sarhan, 71, to file a suit against US Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and General Tommy Franks, commander of US forces in Iraq, after the shepherd claimed a US missile landed on his tent on April 4.