Japan’s top court has ruled as unconstitutional a defunct eugenics law which saw 16,500 disabled people forcibly sterilised between the 1950s and 1990s, according to BBC.

The Supreme Court also ordered the government to pay damages to 11 victims, who were involved in five cases that were heard on appeal.

Wednesday’s landmark ruling brings to an end a decades-long fight for justice by victims who have been demanding compensation and an apology.

After years of lawsuits, a 2019 law finally granted surviving victims damages but some have continued to fight for higher compensation.

In four of the cases brought to the court, the central government had appealed against the lower courts’ compensation orders.

In the fifth case, two female plaintiffs had appealed against a dismissal of their claims, with the lower court citing the statute of limitations.

Under a post-World War Two law enacted in 1948, some 25,000 people – many of whom had inheritable disabilities – underwent surgeries to prevent them from having children deemed “inferior”.

Japan’s government acknowledged that 16,500 of the sterilisation operations were performed without consent, according to BBC.

Although authorities claim the 8,500 other people consented to the procedures, lawyers have said they were “de facto forced” into surgery because of the pressure they faced at the time.

Victims were as young as nine years old, according to a parliamentary report published in June last year.

The law was repealed in 1996.