safeguarding its expectant rights over the property claimed. In July 1994, the court awarded the measures sought and ordered its entry in the corresponding public registry. Nonetheless, despite the issuance of those protective measures, there was indiscriminate cutting of approximately 1,250 hectares of undeveloped brush and forest on the property, and there was a transfer of title by one who figured as the owner of the area claimed. 22. The petitioners also argue that the 87 families5 that constitute the Indigenous Community are living in sub-human conditions alongside the highway running from Pozo Colorado to Concepción, in the department of Presidente Hayes, Chaco. The petitioners state that the deplorable situation in which the members of the Indigenous Community are living was verified by the IACHR during the on-site visit to Paraguay in 1999, and during the December 2002 visit.6 They add that the Paraguayan State recognized the Community’s grave health and food situation through Decree No. 3789/99 of June 23, 1999, which declared the community to be in a state of emergency, and ordered that it be given health and food assistance for the duration of the process of claiming its traditional habitat. 23. Despite the emergency situation declared by the Executive, the petitioners emphasize that the Community’s living conditions in recent years have deteriorated quickly, to the point that its very existence as a human group is endangered. They note that the epidemics and malnutrition are recurrent and fatal in Sawhoyamaxa, with more than 10 deaths due to curable diseases among children and the elderly since 1995. In early 2001, three minors died due to gastrointestinal problems that result from the living conditions, among which they mention the food scarcity and the lack of drinking water. Minors do not receive medical care. 24. The petitioners indicate that another 10 years have elapsed since the claim was submitted to the Paraguayan State, and the authorities have done nothing to guarantee at least a minimal part of land for the Indigenous Community, or to make reparation for the dispossession and clearing of their ancestral lands, including the grave consequences for the well-being and integrity of the Community. B. The State 25. The State, in its first brief setting forth its observations, stated: It is considered that the cases that have been submitted, meeting the due requirements for being addressed in an international mechanism, are those which, so identified, have priority for the Government of Paraguay, and should be so addressed to make progress in improving the human rights situation in the country. As this case has such characteristics, the Government of Paraguay would like to reach a friendly settlement with the petitioners; accordingly, it requests that the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights mediate for this purpose. 26. In addition, the State provided the Commission information on the administrative procedures for acquiring lands through the Institute for Rural Well-being (IBR) as well as the steps taken by the government to assist the indigenous community in view of the presidential decree that declared them to be in a state of emergency. 5 President Decree Nº 3789 states that the community is made up of 63 families. 6 On occasion of the on-site visit to Paraguay in 1999, the “IACHR visited Pozo Colorado district in Presidente Hayes department (El Chaco) in order to speak with the Yakye Axa and Sawhoyamaxa indigenous communities of the Enxet people. The Commission was able to see the deplorable situation of these peoples, who live alongside the national highway, without services of any kind, waiting for the authorities to allocate them the land they need. The Commission appreciates the importance of Presidential Decree No. 3789 of June 23, 1999, which declared these indigenous communities to be in a "state of emergency" on account of the extreme conditions they face. In spite of this, the Commission was told that the effective measures ordered by the executive decree for the immediate provision of medical and nutritional assistance to the families that make up that community have not yet been adopted. Similarly, the Commission will closely follow the results of the efforts that have begun to provide the indigenous communities with the land they need.” Press Release 23/99 of the IACHR. 4