12 the Commission insisting in previously adopting its precautionary measures (which lack conventional force). This is even more necessary when the matter is being heard (regarding to the merits) by the Commission and has not yet been submitted to the Court. And I put forward the following arguments to support my position:35 First, in my opinion, the requirement of the prior exhaustion of domestic remedies is not applicable in requests to the Court for provisional protection measures. This requirement is a condition for the admissibility of petitions to the Commission as regards the merits (and possible reparations) of a specific case. Moreover, the provisional protection measures have a brief procedure, in keeping with the nature of this preventive and protective juridical mechanism, and because it in no way prejudges the merits of the case. Second, I consider that there is no requirement for the Commission’s precautionary measures to be exhausted before recourse can be had to the Inter-American Court to request provisional protection measures and I expressly indicated this in my concurring opinion to a recent Order of the Court on provisional protection measures.36 Moreover, the Commission’s precautionary measures are based on Rules of Procedure rather than on the Convention and cannot delay – at times indefinitely – the application of the Court’s provisional protection measures, which are Convention-based. As I added in the above-mentioned concurring opinion, “in all circumstances, the imperatives of protection should have primacy over apparent institutional rivalries,” particularly in the midst of situations of “chronic violence.”37 The Commission’s insistence in its practice with regard to prior precautionary measures may, in some case, have negative consequences for the potential victims and create one more obstacle for them. In certain cases, it can constitute a denial of justice at the international level. Third, in cases in which the Commission denies precautionary measures, this decision should be duly justified. The decisions of the Commission and the Court concerning both precautionary and provisional measures, respectively, should always be motivated, as a guarantee of respect for the adversary principle – which is a general principle of law – so that the petitioners have certainty that the matter they submitted has been duly and carefully considered by the international instance, and so that the meaning of the decision taken by the latter is clear38 (especially, in an alleged situation of extreme gravity and urgency with the presumed probability of irreparable damage to persons). A decision by the Commission that denies precautionary measures must necessarily be duly justified always. Moreover, an additional negative by the Commission to request the Court to order provisional measures, also without justification, legitimizes the potential victims, as subjects of international human rights law, to resort to the Court to seek the granting of these provisional measures; otherwise, there could be a denial of justice at the international level. Fourth, if the individual petitioner in question, faced by the double negative of the Commission, resorts to the Court and the latter abstains from taking any measures, owing to the alleged lack of basis in the Convention (because the case is pending before the Commission and not before the Court) and in the Rules of Procedure – even to fill this apparent legal vacuum and change the actual situation (based on considerations of equity praeter legem) – there could be a denial of justice at the international level. In two recent cases, I cautioned the Court in this regard.39 35 . Paragraphs 5–11 of my Separate Opinion in the Matter of Mery Naranjo et al., and paragraphs 7–13 of my Separate Opinion in the Matter of Gloria Giralt de García-Prieto et al. 36 . Cf. ICourtHR, Order of November 17, 2005, in the Matter of the Children Deprived of Liberty in the “Complexo do Tatuapé” of FEBEM Regarding Brasil, Concurring Opinion of Judge A. A. Cançado Trindade, par. 3. 37 . Ibid., para. 5. 38 . Cf. [Several authors] Le principe du contradictoire devant les juridictions internationales (eds. H. Ruiz Fabri and J.-M. Sorel), Paris, Pédone, 2004, pp. 14, 33, 81, 86, 118 and 168. 39 . Cf. IACHR, Matter of the Brothers Dante, Jorge and José Peirano Basso regarding Uruguay, letter of July 7, 2006 from Judges A. A. Cançado Trindade and M. E. Ventura-Robles to the President of the Court, doc. CDH-S/1181, pp. 1–2; Matter of Loretta Ortiz Ahlf and Other Mexican Citizens regarding Mexico, letter of September 19, 2006 from Judge A. A. Cançado Trindade to the acting President of the Court, doc. Corte IDH/1641, p. 1.