A further factor contributing to the lack of incentives are the regulations governing lawyers' fees, which render litigation financially not
viable for lawyers and law firms. In Germany, these fees are determined by statutory law and generally depend on the value of the matter in dispute. The latter is usually rather low, due to the courts' restrictive approach towards damages. Relying on inherent principles of German civil law, which is primarily seen as a mechanism for reparation and not for punishment, the courts do not recognize punitive damages and only grant modest sums, even where damages are determined on the basis of the lex loci damni. This implies that the statutory fees are often not high enough to cover the lawyers' costs in developing and managing such complex and long-lasting cases. In the KiK case,the claimants claim 120000 euro in damages, which corresponds to statutory lawyers' fees of approximately 5000 euro. This is not sufficient to cover the costs of the case, involving several client meetings and fact-finding missions in Pakistan, the translation of official documents and the production of legal opinions on Pakistani law and translation services. In fact, the case would not have been filed without the financial and legal pro bono support of several others actors.