104 e) to date the victims live in fear and in extremely precarious situations. Despite the duties of the State vis-à-vis this group of women and children, the families have not attained the dignity and security that they enjoyed before the massacre and the displacement. Pleadings of the State 149. The State did not refer to Article 19 of the American Convention. Considerations of the Court 150. Article 19 of the American Convention establishes that [e]very minor child has the right to the measures of protection required by his condition as a minor on the part of his family, society, and the state. 151. The representatives argued that the State had abridged Article 19 of the Convention, which is not part of the acknowledgment by the State. In the instant case, minors Hugo Fernando and Diego Armando Martínez Contreras were executed in the massacre and others witnessed it. Furthermore, many of the displaced next of kin of the victims were children at the time of the facts and when they suffered the consequences of forced domestic displacement. 152. The Court deems that cases in which the victims of human rights violations are children are especially grave, as they “also [have] special rights derived from their condition, and these are accompanied by specific duties of the family, society, and the State.”213 Article 19 of the American Convention must be understood as a complementary right established by the treaty for human beings who due to their physical and emotional development require special protection measures.214 The principle of their higher interests, based on the very dignity of the human being, on the characteristics of children themselves, and “on the need to foster their development, making full use of their potential” applies in this regard.215 153. The content and scope of Article 19 of the American Convention must be specified, in cases such as the instant one, taking into account the pertinent provisions of the Convention on the Rights of the Child,216 especially its Articles 6, 37, 38 and 39, and of Protocol II to the Geneva Conventions, as these instruments and the American Convention are part of a very comprehensive international corpus juris for protection of children, which the States must respect.217 Together with the 213 See Legal Status and Human Rights of the Child. Advisory Opinion OC-17/02 of August 28, 2002. Series A No. 17, para. 54. Likewise, Case of the “Juvenile Reeducation Institute”, supra note 4, para. 147. 214 See Case of the “Juvenile Reeducation Institute”, supra note 4, para. 147; Case of the Gómez Paquiyauri Brothers, supra note 182, para. 164, and Legal Status and Human Rights of the Child, Advisory Opinion OC-17/02, supra note 213, para. 54. 215 See Legal Status and Human Rights of the Child, Advisory Opinion OC-17/02, supra note 213, para. 56, and Case of Bulacio, supra note 193, para. 134. 216 217 Ratified by Colombia on January 28, 1991, and which entered into force on February 27, 1991. See Case of the “Juvenile Reeducation Institute”, supra note 4, para. 148; Case of the Gómez Paquiyauri Brothers, supra note 182, para. 166; Case of the “Street Children.”(Villagrán Morales et al.), supra note 190, para. 194, and Legal Status and Human Rights of the Child, Advisory Opinion OC-17/02, supra note 213, para. 24.