63 85. 11 years, 8 months and 12 days have passed between that date and when the instant Judgment is issued, and still there has been no definitive solution to the claim made by the members of the Yakye Axa Community. This has been so, despite the fact that Article 4 of Law No. 43/89 establishes that [d]uring the administrative and judicial proceeding set forth in Article 2, the Instituto Paraguayo del Indígena (INDI) and the Instituto de Bienestar Rural (IBR) must propose definitive solutions to the settlements of the indigenous communities in accordance with Law No. 854/63, Agrarian Statute, and Law No. 604/81, Statute of the Indigenous Communities, proposing expropriation pursuant to Article 1 of Law No. 1372/88 when a solution has not been reached by the ways foreseen. 86. The Court deems that a protracted delay, such as the delay in this case, constitutes in itself a violation of the right to fair trial.180 The State can, however, assert that the delay is not unreasonable, if it states and proves that the delay is directly related to the complexity of the case or to the conduct of the parties involved. 87. Based on the background set forth in the chapter on Proven Facts, the Court recognizes that the matter in this case is a complex one and that this must be taken into account to assess whether the duration is reasonable. 88. However, the Court notes that delays in the administrative proceeding addressed in the instant Judgment have not been due to the complexity of the case, but rather to systematic delays in the actions of the State authorities. The IBR in fact asked the INDI a number of times to submit any information they had on the Yakye Axa Community, (supra paras. 50.25 y 50.32) and this institution did not comply with that request. The INDI waited until May 28, 1997 to request the location of the land claimed and to establish its relation with the farms involved, and the technical-anthropological report on the Yakye Axa Community (supra para. 50.33). The attorneys for the Community asked the IBR to conduct a visual inspection of the land claimed (supra para. 50.26), which was not ordered until July 25, 1996 (supra para. 50.31). The IBR only issued ruling No. 755 on September 8, 1998, decreeing that the land claimed was under rational use. The administrative file was sent from the IBR to the INDI and vice versa several times, without giving the Community a definitive answer, and the INDI only decided on November 2, 2001, to ask the Legislative, through the Executive, to expropriate part of the land claimed (supra para. 50.53). 89. The Court therefore deems that despite the proven complexity of the administrative procedure to claim land in the instant case, actions by the competent State authorities have not been compatible with the principle of reasonable term. 90. On the other hand, the State has argued that the representatives never resorted to the administrative law venue to deny that the land was under rational use, and that the interested party never filed a regular lawsuit to establish which right was paramount, whether traditional communal ownership of the land or private property. 91. In this regard, the Court deems that said pleading by the State includes aspects pertaining to non-exhaustion of domestic remedies. In accordance with this 180 See Case of the Serrano Cruz Sisters, supra note 2, para. 69; Case of Ricardo Canese, supra note 179, para. 142, and Case of the 19 Tradesmen, supra note 177, para. 191.

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