alleged infringement of a legal right, the petitioners state that the Ecuadorian State, in its argument, fails to recognize the imminence and severity of harm to human and constitutional rights to which members of the Sarayaku indigenous people were exposed due to acts and omissions by the State and the oil companies operating in their territory, in other words, the main elements that distinguish constitutional amparo from the administrative disputes remedy. Moreover, they added that the State fails to recognize that the Sarayaku indigenous community’s main purpose in filing a constitutional amparo suit was not to request the annulment of the contractual concession signed by the State and the oil company, but rather to put an end to the non-consulted and unconstitutional incursion into their legal and ancestral territory which violated their rights enshrined in the Ecuadorian Constitution and in international treaties, including the American Convention. B. Position of the State 34. In a note received by the Inter-American Commission on June 2, 2004, the State outlined its position regarding the procedural aspects of the petition seeking an exception to the failure to exhaust domestic remedies. It asserted that the Ecuadorian State has no obligations under ILO Convention 169, and requested, finally, that the petition be declared inadmissible and the case closed. 35. With respect to procedural aspects, the State challenged the exception to the failure to exhaust domestic remedies and specified the remedies that should have been exhausted and their effective exercise, based on the Inter-American Court’s position in the sense that it is incumbent upon the State claiming a failure to exhaust domestic remedies to specify the remedies that should be exhausted as well as their effectiveness. 36. The State claims that the remedy used by the petitioners was not the adequate and effective remedy for resolving the alleged infringement of a legal right, because the objective of an action of amparo is prevention, and its purpose is to “put an end to, prevent the commission of, or immediately rectify the consequences of an illegal act” that violates a right protected by the Constitution or by international treaties, as set forth in Article 95 of the Political Constitution of Ecuador, which establishes the following in its first two paragraphs: Anyone, in his own right or as a legitimate representative of a group, may file anamparo suit before the organ of the Judiciary designated by law. Through this action, which will be processed on a preferential and expedited basis, the adoption of urgent measures shall be requested to put an end to, prevent the commission of, or immediately rectify the consequences of an illegal act or omission by a public authority, which violates or could violate any right enshrined in the Constitution or in an international treaty or covenant in force and which threatens to cause imminent serious harm. The suit may also be brought if the act or omission was carried out by individuals providing a public service or acting in representation or through a concession of public authority. Judicial decisions adopted in a proceeding shall not be subject to a writ of amparo. An amparo action also may be lodged against individuals, when their conduct seriously and directly harms a community or collective interest or a general right [derecho difuso]. In an amparo action, there will be no restriction on the judge who must hear it and it will be available every day of the week. 37. The State adds that the preventive nature of the action of amparo means that, once the amparo remedy is accepted and the constitutional violation corrected, the public authorities can once again act on the matter, as long as it does so in keeping with the constitution. Therefore, the constitutional amparo remedy is designed so that a first instance judge, if it is deemed necessary, may adopt urgent measures to prevent harm and not, as is the intention of this petition, to challenge an oil concession contract that, due to its legal nature, should be challenged in a different legal venue. 7