3
With regard to the identification of the victims of these violations, Report 177/10
includes three separate annexes which consist of the list of: i) the victims extrajudicially
executed; ii) the survivors and relatives of the executed victims; and iii) the victims
forcibly displaced. In its merits report (paras. 203-214), the Inter-American Commission
stated the criteria taken into account for the identification of the victims, in order not to
exclude a priori the victim-condition of any person so identified as deceased in the
massacres or as surviving next-of-kin, taking into account the exceptional characteristics
of this case. However, the IACHR clarifies now that much of the data about name, age,
sex or family ties are approximate and imprecise. In this case, the IACHR adopted
“flexible criteria for the identification of the victims,” under the understanding that, as
indicated in one of the recommendations of Report 177/10, it corresponds to the State of
El Salvador to carry out the complete identification of the victims executed in the
Massacres of El Mozote and neighboring locations, as well as the next-of-kin of the
executed victims, within the framework of the proper investigation that it is required to
perform.
Report 177/10 was notified to the State of El Salvador by means of
communication of December 8, 2010, granting it a two-month term to inform on the
implementation of the recommendations. To this date, the State has not replied to the
request made by the Commission.
As a result, the Commission submits the instant case to the jurisdiction of the
Inter-American Court due to the need to obtain justice and the State’s failure to comply
with the recommendations.
Specifically, the Commission submits to the jurisdiction of the Court the State
acts and omissions that occurred after June 6, 1995, the date of the acceptance of the
Court’s jurisdiction by El Salvador. As indicated in Report 177/10, part of the set of facts
that are within the temporal jurisdiction of the Court, includes: the validity of the General
Amnesty Law for the Consolidation of Peace; the omission in the reopening of the
investigations; the absence of continued and sustained efforts to exhume a greater
number of mortal remains; the lack of judicial follow-up of the exhumations carried out
and the information obtained in the framework of the same; the absence of a response
to the requests for the reopening of the investigations; the effects of the massacres and
their impunity on the surviving next-of-kin of the victims; the lack of reparation in favor of
them; and the situation of displacement of some victims. The afore-mentioned, without
prejudice that the State of El Salvador might accept the jurisdiction of the Court to study
the entire case, in accordance with the terms of Article 62(2) of the American
Convention.
The Commission requests that the Court orders the following measures of
reparation:
a)
Make adequate reparations for the violations of human rights, both in
their material and their moral aspect, including the establishment and
dissemination of the historic truth of the events, suitable
commemoration of the victims who died, and implementation of an
appropriate program of psycho-social care for the surviving relatives;
b)
Establish a mechanism to ensure that the victims executed in the
massacres at El Mozote and neighboring locations are identified as
fully as possible and take the necessary steps to pursue the