The Osaka District Court rejected a damages suit Friday filed against Nobel Prize-winning novelist Kenzaburo Oe and his publisher by two plaintiffs who had claimed Oe wrongly stated in his book that Japanese soldiers ordered civilians in Okinawa to commit mass suicide and murder-suicide in 1945.

"It can be said the military was deeply involved in the mass suicides," presiding Judge Toshimasa Fukami ruled, turning down the demand by the plaintiffs that Oe, 73, and Iwanami Shoten Publishers halt the publication of Oe's 1970 essay, "Okinawa Notes," and pay them ¥20 million in compensation.

Yutaka Umezawa, 91, a former garrison commander on Zamami Island in the Okinawa chain, and Hidekazu Akamatsu, the 75-year-old brother of another commander on nearby Tokashiki Island, said they will appeal the ruling to the Osaka High Court.