2 5. In this regard, it is relevant to underline the impossibility of legal persons lodging direct petitions with the inter-American system of human rights (IASHR), Article 1(2) of the American Convention establishes that, for the effects of this treaty, “person” is every human being. In addition, legally recognized, non-governmental organizations in one or more OAS Member States may lodge petitions before the IASHR under Article 44 of the Convention. However, since the focus of the IASHR is the protection of individuals and communities, these legal persons have competence to lodge petitions in their capacity as representatives of physical persons, and are not protected by the rights recognized in the Convention. In other words, the Convention allows special types of legal person to litigate on the rights of physical persons, individually or collectively. 6. In this case, it is exactly the contrary: physical persons requiring possible rights for a legal person, which would undoubtedly be inadmissible in light of the Convention. 7. If the IACHR could admit a petition with regard to a legal person by a physical person, from the legal point of view the latter could only petition if he was legally representing the former. That is, the individuals must be shareholders with a power of attorney from the company, but in this case they did not have this. 8. Moreover, the petitioners were not even RCTV shareholders! They were only shareholders in companies that, in turn were shareholders in RCTV, according to paragraph 65 of the judgment. 9. Based on the documents submitted, it has been concluded that only three of the said indirect shareholders had, at the time of the facts, a direct connection to the communication activities of RCTV. However, even though the Court did not recognize that the indirect investors who did not perform activities related to the company’s mission were holders of the rights relating to freedom of expression (para. 60), the judgment granted protection to all of them with regard to the alleged violations of judicial guarantees. 10. It is worth pointing out that, in these proceedings, the use of the word “shareholders” is questionable because, in fact, no RCTV shareholder is named in the petition. On this point also, I dissent from the majority opinion in the judgment, which repeats the word numerous times even while agreeing that they are not shareholders in RCTV, pursuant to paragraphs 64 and 65. 11. Since they are not directly connected to RCTV, we should not refer to the violation of the human rights of these individuals; rather the consequence was necessarily an effect on the property of the legal persons that owned all the shares in RCTV, and that are not protected by the Convention. In other words, the closure of this television station did not necessarily mean that the physical persons were unable to continue to exercise their activities in their capacity as indirect investors who were not connected to the company, but only the impossibility to maintain the connection between legal persons, which could result in financial prejudices for the companies who owned shares in RCTV. However, as already emphasized, the American Convention does not protect the rights of these entities, as the Court recognized in its judgment by denying the violation of the right to property. 12. Hence, it is necessary to make a distinction between the individuals who worked for RCTV, recognized as victims in this case, and those who were merely connected to the company by indirect patrimonial links. It is the RCTV employees, on whom the daily operations of the television station depended and who effectively implemented its communication mission, who could be considered victims by the Court. After all, as the American Convention establishes,