April 27 (Bloomberg) -- Germany's federal prosecutor won't seek to investigate former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and other top U.S. officials, dealing a blow to groups that had filed a complaint accusing them of war crimes and torture.

The accusations in the Nov. 14 filing don't sufficiently apply to a German law that allows for prosecution no matter where violations occur in the world, the prosecutor's office said today in an e-mailed statement. The authorities said that it's not evident that activities on German soil played a role in the alleged crimes and the accused don't live in Germany.

The criminal complaint, brought in the name of 11 former Iraqi detainees of the Abu Ghraib prison near Baghdad and a detainee in the U.S. prison at Guantanamo Bay, had asked Federal Prosecutor Monika Harms to investigate what responsibility the U.S. government leaders bear for torture and other prisoner abuses and to eventually charge them as war criminals.

Department of Defense spokeswoman Cynthia Smith said at the time that the U.S. had no reason to believe the filing had merit.

The 32 groups that brought the action -- including the U.S. National Lawyers' Guild, the Berlin-based RAV Republican Lawyers Association and the International Federation for Human Rights -- had counted on Germany's universal jurisdiction law, which Michael Ratner, president of New York-based Center for Constitutional Rights, in November called ``the best platform for this case.''

It was the second time the Karlsruhe-based prosecutor turned down a complaint against Rumsfeld. On Feb. 10, 2005, the prosecutor declined to probe Rumsfeld for his role in the abuse of prisoners at Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison. That suit had threatened to prevent the U.S. secretary of defense from attending a security conference in Munich.

The 12 U.S. officials targeted by the complaint included Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, former Central Intelligence Agency Director George Tenet, former Undersecretary of Defense for Intelligence Stephen Cambone and former Commander of U.S. Forces in Iraq Lieutenant General Ricardo Sanchez.

To contact the reporter on this story: Patrick Donahue in Berlin at pdonahue1@bloomberg.net.

Last Updated: April 27, 2007 08:10 EDT