(CN) - Denmark escaped blame on Tuesday over a 2004 Iraq raid after Europe's top human rights court agreed its troops weren't in charge when Iraqi forces reportedly tortured detainees.

In its ruling, Europe's human rights judges said Denmark couldn't be held accountable for what happened during Operation Green Desert, a joint raid near Basra carried out by Danish, British and Iraqi troops.

The judges upheld national court findings that it was Iraq, not Denmark, that had control over the detainees, meaning any mistreatment fell outside the Nordic country's responsibility under European human rights law. The decision likely brings an end to a legal battle dating back to the early days of the Iraq War.

The case revolved around a nighttime raid on Nov. 25, 2004, when Danish troops joined British forces at the request of Iraq's fledgling interim government to help round up suspected insurgents.

The Iraqi men involved said Danish troops detained them, handed them to local forces and then stood by as they were tortured at a British base and an Iraqi police station in Basra, a southern city near the Persian Gulf. They sued Denmark's Ministry of Defense in 2011, claiming they were unlawfully detained and mistreated. The case wound its way through the courts for more than a decade before the Supreme Court in Copenhagen dismissed it in 2022.

The Supreme Court concluded that Danish troops "did not participate in the detention of the Iraqi parties, and consequently they did not surrender them to the Iraqi forces," adding that "the Iraqi forces had full control of the operation." The judges said there was no sign the soldiers saw or heard any abuse, noting that their role was mainly to advise and keep watch over the Iraqi units on the ground.

In Strasbourg on Tuesday, the European court sided with Denmark, saying the country wasn't exercising control over the detainees at any point. 

The judges said therefore most of the complaints were outside the reach of the rights court. The parts dealing with torture and the lack of an effective remedy were thrown out. Only one issue - whether the Iraqis had received a fair hearing in Denmark - was examined, and the court said there'd been no breach.

By the time of the raid, Iraq was in charge of its own territory, so its forces, not Denmark's, were responsible for what happened there. The court added that those who brought the case hadn't shown any clear evidence that Danish troops had control over their arrest, detention, or treatment during or after the operation.

The court also found "no indication that the Danish authorities had failed to carry out an effective investigation." It noted that Denmark's Military Prosecution Service had already looked into the claims several times between 2010 and 2016, interviewing soldiers and reviewing video footage from the mission.

Wouter Vandenhole, professor of human rights law at the University of Antwerp, said the Strasbourg judges "followed their standard restrictive approach" to extraterritorial jurisdiction, stressing that the threshold for finding state control abroad "remains high and is not met by mere presence or support."

He added that the ruling wasn't likely to shift the court's overall stance, but it did mark a small step forward by showing that judges are willing to apply existing case law to how states investigate mistreatment, even when their authority in a conflict zone isn't entirely clear.

In 2004, Iraq was still struggling to recover from the chaos that followed the U.S.-led invasion a year earlier that toppled Saddam Hussein. His fall created a power vacuum, and the country quickly descended into violence as insurgents and sectarian militias fought for control while coalition troops tried to hold the line.

To help steady the situation, the United Nations authorized international forces to assist Iraq in rebuilding and "to maintain stability and security in Iraq and to deter and prevent terrorism" after sovereignty was handed back to the interim government that June.

It was in that volatile landscape - marked by constant bombings, kidnappings and ambushes - that Danish soldiers joined a joint operation with British and Iraqi forces, one of many missions meant to support Iraq's fragile new leadership and contain the unrest in the south.

When the raid began that night, Danish troops stayed largely on the outskirts, securing the perimeter while Iraqi police and National Guard units moved in to make arrests. Denmark's Supreme Court later found that the soldiers' role "was limited to guarding the perimeter rather than taking part in detentions."

Denmark's involvement in Iraq soon became a flashpoint back home. Parliament had initially approved the mission on a six-month mandate, but support waned as reports of prisoner mistreatment emerged. In late 2004, a local Iraqi newspaper published interviews claiming Danish soldiers were linked to torture, triggering internal military investigations that didn't ultimately lead to charges.

None of the Iraqi applicants will receive compensation, and the European Court of Human Rights' ruling will become final in three months unless they request a review by the court's Grand Chamber, a step that's seldom approved.

Representatives for the applicants and the Danish government did not respond to requests for comment.

Courthouse News reporter Eunseo Hong is based in the Netherlands.

Source: Courthouse News Service