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previous Judgment (of 09.18.2003) in the case of Bulacio versus Argentina, "razzias
are incompatible with the respect of fundamental rights,” (para. 93), and the facts of
the present case of Servellón García et al. occurred “within the framework of a
context of violence against children and youngster in situations of social risk in
Honduras.” (para. 104)
III.
A Contemporary Tragedy: The Attacks against Human Rights in
Midst of the Decadence of Social Fabric.
17.
In the expert opinions included in the dossier of the present case, gathered in
the Judgment that this Court has just adopted, there are references to “the streetcleaning policy” and “the State’s ‘zero tolerance’ policy” (para. 37(2)(a)) as well as
to the actions of organized crime, drug traffickers, and “private clandestine groups of
‘social cleaning’.” (para. 37(3)(b)). What we can conclude from the facts of the
present case is, in my opinion, a clear decadence of the social fabric, a social
environment indifferent to the luck of its alienated members, and partisan of
repressive policies, - as can be seen in almost the complete totality of Latin America
and in practically the whole world, especially with regard to youngsters (who live in a
brief present, without a future), and undocumented immigrants.
18.
Not surprisingly and in a good way, the Inter-American Court goes back to its
best jurisprudence of Advisory Opinions n. 17 of The Juridical Condition and Human
Rights of the Child (of 08.28.2002) and n. 18, on The Juridical Condition and Rights
of the Undocumented Migrants (of 09.17.2003), as well as of its Judgments in the
case of the “Street Children” (Villagrán Morales et al.) versus Guatemala (merits,
11.19.1999, and reparations, 05.26.2001). 5 Now, in the present case of Servellón
García et al., the facts that have given origin to the cas d'espèce reveal, once more,
that the cases of this nature represent a micro-cosmos of the violence perpetrated,
without boundaries, against street children throughout the world, revealing at the
same time the sad fate of many of those already alienated and excluded in the dawn
of their lives. For them, life is actually nothing more than a walking shadow, in the
expression of a universal author, and a shadow that fades very rapidly. Their sad
fate evokes the classical regret of Shakespeare’s Macbeth (1606):
"Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow,
Creeps in this petty pace from day to day,
To the last syllable of recorded time;
And all our yesterdays have lighted fools
The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle,
Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage,
And then is heard no more. It is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury
Signifying nothing." 6
19.
But no matter how brief and ephemeral the life of those abandoned by the
world, and tortured and murdered with brutality by their piers, they occupy, as
victims, a center stage in the International Law on Human Rights. The establishment
of the centralization of the victims within the conceptual universe of International
.
Paras. 113, 95, 114, and 116 respectively, of the present Judgment.
.
Shakespeare, Macbeth (1606), act V, scene 5.
5
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