15 44. In 1958, Cuban jurist F.V. García Amador, who at the time was the ILC rapporteur on Responsibility of the States, noted that certain forms of reparation have a clear and distinctly punitive purpose (punitive damages/dommages-intérêts punitifs) and involve imputing criminal responsibility to the State for violation of certain international obligations –especially, grave violations of fundamental human rights, analogous to crimes against humanity.54 Thus, the very “duty of providing reparation” (with an initial civil law connotation) varies according to “the nature and function of the reparation in specific cases;” reparation, thus, does not always have the same form or the same purpose, and in the case of punitive damages (cf. infra) it contains a criminal element of responsibility.55 45. The whole chapter on reparations for human rights violations requires greater conceptual and case-law development, based on recognition of the close relationship between the right to reparations and the right to justice. Said development is especially necessary in face of grave and systematic human rights violations, which in turn require a firm reproval of the illicit conduct of the State, and dissuasive reparations, to ensure non-recidivism of the injurious acts, taking into account both the expectations of the next of kin of the victim and the higher interests or needs of the society. 46. In effect, one cannot deny the close link between reparations and combating impunity, as well as ensuring non-recidivism of the injurious acts, always and necessarily from the perspective of the victims. True reparatio, linked to realization of justice, requires overcoming obstructions of the duty to investigate and to punish those responsible, and putting an end to impunity. In other words, contrary to what the Inter-American Court maintained in the past,56 it is my view that reparations can perfectly well be both compensatory and punitive, with the aim of putting an end to impunity and ensuring realization of justice –which is perfectly in accordance with the current stage of development of international law. 47. The provisions of Article 63(1) of the American Convention on Human Rights57 do in fact open a very broad horizon for the Inter-American Court of Human Rights in the matter of reparations. Exemplarizing or dissuasive reparations, consistent with an aggravated responsibility, may contribute to ensure non-recidivism of the injurious acts and to the struggle against impunity. In my several years of experience as a Judge at the Inter-American Court, I have been able to corroborate how the States have less difficulty complying with pecuniary reparations than with reparations pertaining to the duty to investigate and punish those responsible for human rights violations, in other words, ultimately, the realization of justice. 48. As stated in a Joint Separate Opinion in the Loayza Tamayo versus Peru case (Reparations, Judgment of 27.11.1998), treatment given to measures of reparation in 54 . F.V. García Amador, "State Responsibility - Some New Problems", 94 Recueil des Cours de l'Académie de Droit International de La Haye (1958) pp. 396-398. 55 . Ibid., p. 409. . In the judgments on “compensatory indemnification” (of 1989) in the Velásquez Rodríguez and Godínez Cruz cases, cit. supra n. (47). 56 57 . Article 63(1) de la American Convention provides that: “If the Court finds that there has been a violation of a right or freedom protected by this Convention, the Court shall rule that the injured party be ensured the enjoyment of his right or freedom that was violated. It shall also rule, if appropriate, that the consequences of the measure or situation that constituted the breach of such right or freedom be remedied and that fair compensation be paid to the injured party.”