In the case of compensation for Nazi victims, Germany has partially withdrawn its claim against Italy before the International Court of Justice.
As the court in The Hague announced at the weekend, the Federal Republic withdrew the application for provisional legal protection in a letter received on May 5th.
This happened because a law came into force in Italy on May 1st that prohibits courts from confiscating German state property on Italian soil.
Institutions such as the Goethe Institute or the German School in Rome are no longer in danger of being confiscated because of court decisions.
The hearings scheduled for Monday and Tuesday have been cancelled.
The core of the actual lawsuit before the UN Court of Justice in The Hague, however, remains.
Germany objects to Italy allowing its courts to continue allowing individual claims for damages by victims of Wehrmacht and SS crimes during World War II.
Rome is defying a 2012 ruling by the International Court of Justice through the practice.
Germany insists that Italy recognize the principle of state immunity in civil lawsuits.
During the Second World War, the Wehrmacht and the SS had raged in many places during their retreat from Italy and often committed terrible war crimes.
Thousands of civilians were killed, some of them horribly.