I INTRODUCTION OF THE CASE AND PURPOSE OF THE DISPUTE 1. The case submitted to the Court. On January 28, 2014,1 the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (hereinafter “the Commission” or “the Inter-American Commission”) submitted the case of the Kaliña and Lokono peoples (hereinafter “the Kaliña and Lokono peoples”) against the Republic of Suriname (hereinafter “the State” or “Suriname”) to the jurisdiction of the InterAmerican Court of Human Rights. According to the Commission, this case relates to the international responsibility of the State for a series of violations of the rights of the members of eight communities of the Kaliña and Lokono indigenous peoples of the Lower Marowijne River in Suriname, specifically, owing to the absence at this time of a legal framework that recognizes the legal personality of the indigenous peoples. This means that, to date, the Kaliña and Lokono peoples have not received this recognition. In addition, the State has not established a legal and regulatory framework that would permit recognizing the right to collective ownership of the lands, territories and natural resources of the Kaliña and Lokono indigenous peoples. This lack of recognition has been accompanied by the issue of individual property titles to non-indigenous persons; the granting of concessions and licenses to carry out mining operations; and the establishment and continuation of three nature reserves in part of their ancestral territory. The violations of the right to collective property resulting from this situation continue to this day. Furthermore, neither the granting of mining concessions and licenses nor the establishment and permanence to date of the nature reserves were subject to any consultation procedure aimed at obtaining the prior, free and informed consent of the Kaliña and Lokono peoples. All these facts have taken place in a context of lack of legal and judicial protection because Suriname has no effective remedies for the indigenous peoples to be able to claim their rights. 2. Procedure before the Commission. The procedure before the Commission was as follows: a) Petition. On February 16, 2007, the Commission received a petition lodged by eight traditional leaders on behalf of the Kaliña and Lokono peoples of the Lower Marowijne River; by the Vererniging van Inheese Dorpshoofden in Suriname (hereinafter “VIDS” in Dutch, or the Association of Indigenous Village Leaders in Suriname in English); and by the Commissie Landrechten Inheemsen Beneden-Marowijne (hereinafter “CLIM” in Dutch, and the Lower Marowijne Indigenous Lands Rights Commission, in English),2 against Suriname owing to the violation of Articles 3, 21 and 25 of the American Convention, in relation to Articles 1 and 2 of this instrument, to the detriment of the Kaliña and Lokono indigenous peoples.3 b) Admissibility Report. On October 15, 2007, the Commission issued Admissibility Report No. 76/07 (hereinafter “the Admissibility Report” or “Report No. 76/07”), in which it concluded that it was competent to examine the petition and decided to admit it based on 1 On January 26, 2014, the Court received the brief submitting the case in Spanish, and this was forwarded in English two days later, that is, on January 28, 2014. The Court will consider this last date as that of the submission, since English is the official language of the case (merits file, folio 88). 2 The Lower Marowijne Indigenous Lands Rights Commission (CLIM) subsequently changed its name to the Organization of Kaliña and Lokono Indigenous Peoples of Marowijne (KLIM) as indicated in an activities report prepared by VIDS and KLIM in relation to their participation in the case before the Inter-American Commission (evidence file, folio 2098). 3 During the proceedings before the Commission, the legal representatives of the petitioners were Fergus MacKay, Senior Counsel, Forest Peoples Programme; David Padilla, assistant legal counsel, and Jacqueline Jubithana, assistant legal counsel (merits file, folio 9). 4