| | |  Editorials | Issues | August 2008 
Tortuous Road to Justice in Inter-American System
 Raúl Pierri - Inter Press Service
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 |  | Some of the cases that reach the Court become symbols of the struggle for human rights. |  | | | |
Montevideo - Financial costs and lack of information are the main hurdles that public defenders must overcome in order to bring cases before the Inter-American Court on Human Rights, which ended its XXXV extraordinary period of sessions Friday in the Uruguayan capital.
"Cost is a big problem," Brazilian public defender Clodoaldo Queiroz told IPS. "In general, public defenders’ offices in Latin America don't receive much support from their governments. There is not enough funding. In Brazil, for example, only in the last few years have we begun to receive more attention from the government. At this point, that’s the main obstacle."
Filing human rights cases before the Court, after having exhausted all legal avenues in their countries, which also involves significant costs for plaintiffs, can take several years and involve a large number of trips abroad, since the Court not only meets at its headquarters in San José, Costa Rica, but also holds sessions in different cities around the Americas.
"I don't know how much it could cost to bring a case before the Court. There are travel expenses, hotel costs, paperwork and procedures…and there are cases that drag on for a long time," Alejandro Bonanni, with the public defenders’ office in the southern Uruguayan city of Pando, told IPS. "In addition, technical experts have to be hired for the evidence."
As a result, plaintiffs and lawyers often seek financial support from foundations or non-governmental organisations (NGOs).
"In our particular case, so far we have not had any experience in this respect, because turning to the Court implies a major outlay of funds, which our clients generally lack, and we depend on organisations that can help," Paulina Pérez Núñez, the national director of the Public Defenders’ Office of Honduras, remarked to IPS.
But lawyers who work as public defenders - the provision of which is a basic guarantee of due process - also face a lack of knowledge about Court procedures and legal precedents. The way the Court operates differs from the criminal justice systems of the various countries in the region. Some nations, for example, do not use public, oral trials, and the entire process is carried out in writing.
"The main difficulty is knowledge. We have basically been trained to handle cases at the domestic level. And we lack the training we would need to turn to the international bodies," public defender Jacinto Castillo from the Dominican Republic told IPS.
To respond to that need, the first Inter-American training programme for public defenders in the Americas was held this week in Montevideo, organised by the Court and the Inter-American Association of Public Defenders Offices as part of the Court’s extraordinary session, which opened Monday.
The Court is an autonomous judicial institution created to apply and interpret the American Convention on Human Rights, which was adopted in 1969.
Twenty-five countries have ratified the Convention, and thus are subject to the jurisdiction of the Court: Argentina, Barbados, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Dominica, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Grenada, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, Jamaica, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Suriname, Trinidad and Tobago, Uruguay and Venezuela.
The Court receives cases in which a state is accused of a violation of the Convention on Human Rights, after all domestic legal avenues have been exhausted. However, individuals and groups cannot take cases directly to the Court, but must first lodge a complaint with the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR).
If the Washington-based IACHR declares a case admissible and the state is found to be at fault, the Commission generally presents the state with a list of recommendations, including precautionary measures, to remedy and make amends for the human rights violation in question.
Only if the state fails to comply with the recommendations, or if the IACHR deems the case to be of particular importance, will the case be referred to the Court, which means turning to the Court is seen as a measure of last resort.
Some of the cases that reach the Court become symbols of the struggle for human rights, like the forced disappearance of Renato Ticona on Jul. 22, 1980, just a few days after the coup d’etat staged by dictator Luis García Meza in Bolivia.
The leftist activist was detained by a military patrol along with his brother Hugo near a checkpoint in the western city of Oruro. Both men were tortured. Hugo was eventually released, but Renato was never heard from again. The case, which was filed in court in Bolivia in 1982, never got beyond the preliminary investigation stage, and was brought before the IACHR, which referred it to the Court.
On Wednesday, the Court held a public hearing in the Uruguayan capital, in which the Bolivian state acknowledged its responsibility for the forced disappearance and apologised.
The next step is for the state to make reparations to Ticona’s family - who continue to insist, nevertheless, that his killers be brought to justice - and to establish the whereabouts of the victim’s remains.
"The state is not our enemy…This hearing, above and beyond the legal aspects, should be educational, in the sense that the ruling contributes to strengthening democracy in Bolivia," Bolivian ombudsman Waldo Albarracín told IPS.
"Democracy is more than just electing officials through the ballot box," he said. "It also implies living in a context of respect for human rights, and means that impunity does not continue to surround pending cases, whether or not they date back to a dictatorship. We want to set a precedent so that no government in Bolivia, whether civilian or military, will ever again illegally detain, torture and ‘disappear’ people. This is about creating a culture of human rights."
Most of the public defenders taking part in this week’s activities in Montevideo expressed a positive view of how the Court functions, and stressed that its rulings carry significant weight in their countries.
"The Court exercises great influence in the area of human rights, and people have gradually come to understand its importance," Costa Rican public defender Diana Montero commented to IPS.
For Pérez Núñez, the Inter-American human rights system "plays a very positive role, because of the recommendations it hands down, and because the states party accept the recommendations and fulfil them."
Queiroz said that "even though it lacks the infrastructure to deal with more cases, the Court has produced important results." He pointed out, for instance, that the Court’s conclusions on a case of domestic violence against Maria da Penha prompted legislative reform in Brazil in 2006.
"A new law was created that provides greater protection for women who are victims of domestic violence. Now the crimes committed against women are considered much more serious than in the past," he said.
"This is very significant, because it arose from a case handled by the Court. Although the woman suffered two attempts on her life at the hands of her abusive husband, it took the Brazilian courts 20 years to convict him. The case was brought before the Court, and after it issued its ruling, Brazil reached an agreement with the Court, committing itself to pay reparations to the victim (who was left paraplegic by the first murder attempt) and modify the legislation," said Queiroz.
At the opening of this week’s session, the acting president of the Court, Peruvian Judge Diego García Sayán, said that half of the 180 rulings handed down in the 25 years since the Court was created have been issued in the last four years alone.
This performance was praised by several of the public defenders who spoke to IPS.
The Court "only has pending cases from 2007. That means there is essentially no backlog. Today we can consider one year to be a very short delay. Most of the sentences have been handed down in the last four years, which means the current members have made a point of resolving cases as fast as possible," said Bonanni.
Albarracín stressed that the Court handles cases against states, not individuals, unlike the International Court of Justice in The Hague. This, in his view, means justice can be achieved even years after the crime, and even if those who physically committed the crime are not alive anymore or are outside of the Court’s jurisdiction.
But not everyone is fully satisfied. "Something that I have always wondered about, with respect to access to the Court, is how long it takes it to reach a decision. It has taken more than 15 or 20 years in some cases. I know that depends on the particular characteristics of each case. But I believe delayed justice merely compounds an injustice," said Castillo. |
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