28 76. That the Commission expressed that “any action carried out by the State in order to comply with payment of the compensations […] shall take into account the will of the beneficiaries, either expressed directly or through the representatives duly appointed before the Tribunal from the start of the judicial stage of the process before the Inter-American System.” Likewise, the Commission stated that, “it is evident that there are very big differences between the assessment the State has of what it has done and the assessment of the victims’ representatives regarding the actions carried out by the State.” It considered that based on the information provided during the hearing, it cannot assume a position, reason for which it asks that the Court require from the State a detailed response regarding each of the matters discussed at the hearing. 77. That any dispute regarding agreements on fees between the representatives and the beneficiaries shall be resolved through the corresponding mechanisms within domestic law. However, the representatives have the duty to inform the Tribunal, especially during the processing of the case in its contentious stage, of the agreements on fees that result in the victims not receiving the totality of the compensatory amount ordered in their favor. On the other hand, the Court urges the State to remove all the hindrances of an administrative nature or any other nature that may prevent the effective compliance of the obligations to pay that correspond to the latter and it especially considers that in those cases in which the victims or their next of kin have granted a specific written mandate to a third party to receive the payments ordered in the mentioned Judgment, after the notification of the same, pursuant with the legal requirements established within domestic law, payment may be made through their representatives.15 e) Public summons in order to make the payments 78. That the representatives referred to the situation of risk that could result from a public summons in order to make the payments of compensations to the next of kin declared beneficiaries. During the hearing they mentioned that the State made that summons even on the National Army’s radio stations. They stated that, in general, a public summons is made when the name and location of the beneficiaries is unknown, which is not the case here. Therefore, they requested that this Tribunal order the State to suspend payment of the compensations through public announcements –stated in Order No. 825 of April 3, 2008 of the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Justice- since it puts the beneficiaries at risk. In this sense, they also informed of the existence of telephone threats to three of the beneficiaries of compensations. The commission shared the representatives’ concern, considering that it can place the next of kin of the victims at risk due to the high levels of insecurity, violence, and crime present in the areas where some of them live. 79. That with regard to that expressed by the representatives, the State informed it had sent official and personal letters to a number of beneficiaries and it “had been careful not to mention proper names,” precisely to avoid putting them at risk. Additionally, the State indicated that it seemed strange to it that the victims had not informed it they were being the objects of pressures. Likewise, the State mentioned that the complaints regarding the threats received by some of the beneficiaries of the compensations had not been filed and that it had asked that the representatives inform the competent authorities of the alleged facts. 15 The Court made a similar ruling in the monitoring of compliance with the judgment issued in the Case of the La Rochela Massacre v. Colombia, which was communicated to the State through the Secretariat’s note of May 15, 2008.

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