6
the Court also found it proved that the measures adopted by the State to comply
with the decree were insufficient and inadequate.7 Indeed, at least 19 persons died
following the entry into force of the said emergency decree.8 Most of them were
children under the age of three; and the cause of death was attributed to diseases
that could reasonably have been foreseen, avoided and treated at little cost.9
7.
That the Court had also verified the contents of one of the expert opinions
submitted to it, to the effect that “the few [members of the Community who were ill
and] who managed to reach a doctor or a medical center, did so when it was too late
or were treated very inadequately or, more precisely, were treated inhumanely.”10
8.
That, based on the foregoing and other considerations, the Court declared
that Paraguay had “violated Article 4(1) of the American Convention, in relation to
Article 1(1) thereof, because it has not adopted the necessary positive measures
within its powers, which could reasonably be expected, to prevent or avoid
endangering the right to life of the members of the Sawhoyamaxa Community.” In
addition, the Court considered that the deaths of the 19 child members of the
Community could be attributed to the State, “precisely owing to the absence of
prevention measures, which also constituted a violation of Article 19 of the
Convention.”11
9.
That, unlike the provisional measures that the Court orders pursuant to
Article 63(2) of the American Convention, which require the prima facie
demonstration of a situation of extreme gravity and urgency, the instant case
embodies an extreme gravity and urgency that are not merely evident prima facie,
but were fully proved before the Court and expressly declared by the Court in its
judgment. Furthermore, the extreme situation of the members of the Community
constituted in itself a violation of Article 4 of the Convention, owing to the absence of
adequate measures to prevention the violation of their right to life (supra eighth
considering paragraph). Consequently, the Court ordered the State to adopt a series
of measures designed to bring an end to this violation, in particular in the ninth and
tenth operative paragraphs (supra first having seen paragraph), which ordered the
State to provide the Community with the basic goods and services necessary for
survival, and to set up a communication system enabling the victims to contact the
competent health authorities in case of emergencies. The obligation to provide goods
was of an immediate nature, to be complied with as soon as the judgment of May
25, 2006, was notified to the State; while the communication system should have
been established within the non-extendible period of six months from this
notification.
10.
That, likewise, in the instant case it was not a question of avoiding irreparable
damage to persons for facts that remained to be proved, but rather to halt the
consequences of a violation of the Convention that had already been declared by the
7
Cf. Case of the Sawhoyamaxa Indigenous Community, supra note 6, para.170.
8
Cf. Case of the Sawhoyamaxa Indigenous Community, supra note 6, paras. 73(74)(1), 5 to 16,
20, 22 and 27 to 30.
9
Cf. Case of the Sawhoyamaxa Indigenous Community, supra note 6, paras. 73(74) and 171.
10
Cf. Case of the Sawhoyamaxa Indigenous Community, supra note 6, para. 176.
11
Cf. Case of the Sawhoyamaxa Indigenous Community, supra note 6, para. 178.
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