19 incidents or excesses committed by soldiers and their immediate commanding officers. […] Everything indicates that these deaths took place as part of a pattern of conduct, a deliberate strategy to eliminate or terrorize the peasant population in areas where the guerrillas were active in order to deprive them of a source of supplies and information, as well as of the possibility of disguising themselves or hiding within the population.” According to the Truth Commission, it cannot be argued that this pattern of conduct could be attributed only to local leaders and that their superior officers were unaware of it, as the massacres of the peasant population were repeatedly denounced with no evidence that any effort was made to investigate them. C. The systematic pattern of forced disappearances of children during the armed conflict in El Salvador 51. The phenomenon of forced disappearance in the armed conflict in El Salvador was addressed by the Truth Commission for El Salvador with the support of the United Nations, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, international agencies, authorities and bodies of the State itself, and other organizations. However, there was also a more specific pattern, acknowledged by the State, relating to the forced disappearance of children (supra para. 17), who were taken and illegally held by the Armed Forces during counterinsurgency operations.34 Likewise, it has been established that, in many cases, this practice implied the appropriation of children and their registration under a different name or with false personal data.35 52. According to the evidence in the case file, at May 2011, the Search Association had received 881 complaints of children disappeared during the armed conflict; of these, 363 had been resolved, including those who were located alive and those found dead. From these cases, they were able to reunite 224 young people with their families.36 Even though the Search Association is one of the representatives in this case, it is important to highlight that it is the institution that has documented and investigated this phenomenon most 34 Cf. Asociación Pro-Búsqueda, La paz en construcción. Un estudio sobre la problemática de la niñez desaparecida por el conflicto armado en El Salvador, January 2003 (evidence file, volume IV, attachment 5 to the pleadings, motions and evidence brief, folio 2619/24); Asociación Pro-Búsqueda, La problemática de niñas and niños desaparecidos como consecuencia del conflicto armado interno en El Salvador, April 1999 (evidence file, volume IV, attachment 10 to the pleadings, motions and evidence brief, folios 3207/32 to 3702/33); Asociación Pro-Búsqueda, El día más esperado. Buscando a los niños desaparecidos de El Salvador. UCA Editores, San Salvador, 2001 (evidence file, volume V, attachment 11 to the pleadings, motions and evidence brief, folios 3223); Asociación Pro-Búsqueda, Report on El Salvador to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, La actuación del Estado de El Salvador en la problemática de la niñez desaparecida a consecuencia del conflicto armado, October 2005 (evidence file, volume V, attachment 12 to the pleadings, motions and evidence brief, folio 3540); Asociación Pro-Búsqueda, La problemática de la niñez desaparecida en El Salvador. Document prepared for the visit of the Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances, February 5, 2007 (evidence file, volume V, attachment 13 to the pleadings, motions and evidence brief, folio 3584), and Laínez Villaherrera, Rosa América and Hasbún Alvarenga, Gianina, Tejiendo nuestra identidad. Intervención psicosocial en la problemática de la niñez desaparecida en El Salvador, Asociación Pro-Búsqueda, San Salvador, 2004 (evidence file, volume VI, attachment 28 to the pleadings, motions and evidence brief, folio 3958). In addition, the FMLN had exerted pressure on some of its members to leave their children in “safe houses” to act as a screen for clandestine activities. Cf. Asociación Pro-Búsqueda, La paz en construcción… (evidence file, volume IV, attachment 5 to the pleadings, motions and evidence brief, folios 2619/17 and 2619/18); Asociación Pro-Búsqueda, La problemática de niñas and niños desaparecidos… (evidence file, volume IV, attachment 10 to the pleadings, motions and evidence brief, folios 3207/13 to 3207/15), and Asociación Pro-Búsqueda, El día más esperado… (evidence file, volume V, attachment 11 to the pleadings, motions and evidence brief, folios 3223 to 3224 and 3378). 35 Cf. Expert opinion provided by Ana Georgina Ramos de Villalta before notary public (affidavit) on May 5, 2011 (evidence file, volume XI, affidavits, folios 7535 to 7537), and Expert opinion provided by Douglass Cassel before notary public (affidavit) on May 11, 2011 (evidence file, volume XI, affidavits, folios 7552 to 7575). 36 Cf. Expert opinion provided by Ana Georgina Ramos de Villalta, supra note 35, (evidence file, volume XI, affidavits, folio 7530).