54 IX THE STATE’S INTERNATIONAL RESPONSIBILITY IN THE CONTEXT OF THE INSTANT CASE 62. This case has unique historic importance: the facts occurred in the context of the systematic practice of arbitrary detention, torture, execution and disappearance perpetrated by the intelligence and security forces of the dictatorship of Alfredo Stroessner, under “Operation Condor,” whose characteristics and dynamics have been described in the proven facts (supra paras. 61(1) to 61(14)). In other words, the grave acts took place in the context of the flagrant, massive and systematic repression to which the population was subjected on an inter-State scale, because State security agencies were let loose against the people at a transborder level in a coordinated manner by the dictatorial Governments concerned. 63. The Court deems it appropriate to include this chapter because it finds that the context in which the facts took place permeates and conditions the State’s international responsibility in relation to its obligation to respect and safeguard the rights embodied in Articles 4, 5, 7, 8 and 25 of the Convention, with regard to both the aspects acknowledged by the State and those that will be determined in the following chapters on merits and reparations. 64. As indicated (supra paras. 61(5), 61(6) and 61(9)), during the 1970s, the fact that power in the region was held by a majority of dictatorial regimes, which shared the “national security doctrine” as their ideological basis, allowed the repression of individuals considered to be “subversive elements” to acquire a transborder nature through “Operation Condor.” This was the code name given to the “alliance of security forces and intelligence services” of the Southern Cone dictatorships. In Paraguay, the Department of Military Intelligence was responsible for coordinating all matters relating to “Operation Condor” and the Police Investigations Department was in charge of operational functions. 65. In this regard, the national courts of Argentina, Chile and Spain, among others, that have opened criminal cases against those involved in “Operation Condor” have described its activities in similar terms. For example, it has been categorized as an “illegal relationship established between the Governments and intelligence services” of the different countries, distinguished from other mechanisms of political persecution implemented on the continent during the 1970s and 1980s, because of the element of cooperation that existed among them, which allowed them “to develop military and intelligence operations outside their own territorial jurisdiction.”47 In addition, the purpose of this “criminal organization, […] supported by the [State’s] institutional structures,” was “to achieve a series of political and economic goals that would reaffirm the bases of the conspiracy and terrorize the population.”48 In this regard, “Operation Condor” has been considered “a sort of ‘international terror mechanism’ [or a] terrorist criminal action, organized and 47 Cf. Court I of the Federal Chamber, Ruling on Plan Condor of May 23, 2002, Case No. 33714 “Videla, Jorge R. impeachment”, Court 7 - Secretariat 14, Buenos Aires, Argentina, Having seen and considering paragraph 11, para. 2. 48 Cf. Central Trial Court No. 5, National Court of Spain, court order expanding the impeachment of A. Pinochet Ugarte and ratifying the preventive detention of the accused, as well as the international arrest warrants dated October 16 and 18, 1998. Preliminary proceedings 19/97-J Separate File III. ChileOperation Condor, April 30, 1999, Madrid, p. 2.