Berlin  - A former chief justice of Germany's federal constitutional court, Ernst Benda, died Monday at the age of 84.

Benda headed the bench from 1971 to 1983. The court is Germany's most powerful, reviewing legislation and court decisions to establish if they conform with the German constitution.

Previously he had been a federal legislator for the Christian Democratic Union (CDU), the party nowadays headed by Chancellor Angela Merkel, and became German interior minister in 1968.

German President Horst Koehler praised Benda's record, saying Monday he had been an eminent figure in Germany. dpa