Ford Motor Co and IBM Corp will again have to face a U.S. lawsuit claiming they encouraged race-based human rights abuses in apartheid-era South Africa, despite...recent court decisions limiting...such cases... U.S. District Judge Shira Scheindlin in Manhattan accepted an argument...that corporations may be held liable under...the Alien Tort Statute (ATS)... "No principle of domestic or international law supports the conclusion that the norms enforceable through the ATS ... apply only to natural persons and not to corporations," Scheindlin wrote... [The] 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals...had said [the case] should be dismissed... The plaintiffs contended that by having made military vehicles and computers for South African security forces...[the] companies...had aided and abetted...[the] apartheid government in perpetrating abuses, such as killings and torture. The litigation seeks class action status, with potential damages in the billions of dollars. [Refers to claims against Daimler, Rheinmetall, General Motors that were dismissed; also refers to Kiobel v. Royal Dutch/Shell.]