By Anita Snow, Associated Press

HAVANA (AP)-- Cuba feels no obligation to honor a U.S. judge's order to pay more than $184 million to the families of three Americans killed when Cuban jets shot down their private planes off the island's coast, the government said Thursday.

"The supposed conclusions of the judge are illegitimate, are contrary to international law,'' Foreign Ministry spokesman Alejandro Gonzalez said during a regular weekly news conference. "This court proceeding was orchestrated by sectors hostile to Cuba.''

U.S. District Judge James Lawrence King ruled Wednesday that the Cuban government should pay $49.9 million in compensatory damages and its air force should pay $134.7 million in punitive damages.

Cuba refused to recognize the court's jurisdiction and didn't defend itself.

It was the first such ruling against the communist nation under a new U.S. law aimed at nations it has labeled terrorist states.

Four members of the Miami-based group Brothers to the Rescue who were searching for refugees on rafts were killed when Cuban MiGs shot down two private planes in the Florida Straits on Feb. 24, 1996. Only three of them were U.S. citizens and eligible to sue under U.S. law.

Even if their families get U.S. permission to collect from Cuban assets frozen in the United States, the amount available won't cover the entire judgment.

Cuba maintains that the planes were shot down after violating Cuban airspace. The United States insists that the planes were shot down over international waters. A U.N. panel ruled last year that the planes were shot down over international waters and that Cuba violated international law.

© 1997 Associated Press