The courts in north China's Hebei Province have started taking compensation lawsuits by victims in the tainted milk scandal, said a local court president here Friday.

A total of 152 people have raised lawsuits at Hebei courts, said Gao Yong, president of the Hebei Provincial Higher People's Court, on the sidelines of the annual session of the National People's Congress, or the parliament.

Ten people who were convicted and sentenced to jail or death in the lawsuits have appealed, including Tian Wenhua, former chairwoman of Sanlu Group at heart of the scandal who was sentenced to jail for life, and a man named Geng Jinping who was sentenced to death under the conviction of manufacturing and selling toxic food.

The melamine contamination of milk have left at least six infants dead and almost 300,000 ill.

Three men have been sentenced by the Shijiazhuang Intermediate People's Court in January to death, including one with a two-year reprieve. Eighteen others including Tian were sentenced to jail ranging from two years to life.

"Some media reports said the courts would not accept compensation cases. That's not true," said Gao.

He said during the past months the courts were waiting for dairy companies to compensate. "Now the companies' compensation have ended. We will accept cases raised by victims who refused to take money from companies and seek compensation via lawsuits."

In a letter sent to victims in December, Sanlu and 21 other dairy companies offered 200,000 yuan (US$29,000) for families whose children died, 30,000 yuan for serious cases such as kidney stones and acute kidney failure, and 2,000 yuan for less severe cases.

Parents of victims who do not accept the one-time compensation are asked to sign a document. They can then go on to seek retribution through lawsuits, the letter said.

About 90 percent of the families of the victims have been compensated as of Jan. 22, the China Dairy Industry Association said.

Families of 262,662 children had signed agreements with involved enterprises to accept compensation, while families of 23,651 kids have yet to be reached mainly because of wrong or untrue registration of names, the association said.

Among the families of six dead children and 891 other infants who were seriously sickened, all except two had accepted compensation, it added.

On Wednesday, Beijing-based dairy producer Sanyuan bought Sanlu Group, which has been declared insolvent.

Sanlu had been China's leading producer of milk powder for 15 years until the melamine scandal broke out in September last year. The group's revenue hit 10 billion yuan in 2007.

(Xinhua News Agency March 7, 2009)