17 consists in the lato sensu “punitive damages,” these being conceived beyond the purely monetary sense to them improperly awarded (in certain national jurisdictions), as certain reparation duties that the liable States must assume by criminal acts or practices; said duties may configure an adequate response or reaction of the legal system against the State crime. They are obligations to perform. And, among these, there is the obligation to identify, trial and punish the perpetrators of State crimes who, by their acts (or omissions), incurred in international criminal liability, apart from compromising the international liability of their State, in the name of which they acted (or omitted), in the execution of a criminal State policy. It is not the case of purely individual acts (or omissions), but a criminality organized by the State itself. Consequently, it becomes necessary to take jointly into account, the criminal international liability of the individuals involved as well as the international liability of the State, essentially supplementary; the aggravated international responsibility of the State in question corresponds to the State crime”; (paras. 52-53 and 55-56). 58. In cases such as this one, where the State power apparatus was improperly used to commit State crimes (in a shocking distortion of the State purposes), constituting inadmissible violations of the jus cogens, to then conceal said crimes and keep its agents perpetrators of those crimes- in impunity, and the victims´ next of kin (also victimized) in the most complete desolation and desperation, -in cases as those of La Cantuta and Barrios Altos, in which the crimes against human rights were perpetrated in the context of a proven practice by the State,- the patient reconstitution and determination of the facts by this Court constitute, themselves, one of the ways of providing satisfaction - as a form of reparation - owed to the victims´surviving next of kin (who are also victims), and a way to honor the memory of the deceased victims. 59. The jus cogens resists State crimes, and imposes sanctions to them, by virtue of the prompt commitment of the international aggravated liability of the State. As a consequence of said crimes, the owed reparations assume the way of different obligations to perform, including the investigation, trial and punishment of those responsible for the perpetration of the State crimes (by action or omission). The Law does not cease to exist by the violation of its rules, as the “realists” expect to insinuate, degenerated by their inevitable and pathetic idolatry for the established power. Very much on the contrary, the imperative law (jus cogens) immediately reacts against those violations, and it imposes sanctions. 60. For years, within this Court, I have insisted upon the need to recognize and identify the jus cogens, and I have elaborated, in several Opinions (both in adversarial and in consulting functions for the Court), the doctrinal construction of the application of the material content of the jus cogens and the corresponding erga omnes obligations of protection, in both their horizontal (vis-à-vis the international community as a whole) and vertical (encompassing the relations of the individual with the public power and with nonState entities and other individuals). With this, under the American Convention, the concept of “victim” itself has evolved and expanded, and so have the parameters of protection owed to the justiciable ones and the circle of protected people. 61. I feel grateful because the Court has adopted my reasoning, which today is an acquis, a conquest of its jurisprudence constante on the matter. Now that my time as Incumbent Judge of this Court expires, a Court which has assumed a vanguard position among the contemporary international courts regarding to this matter in particular, I feel entirely free to point out that this is an advance that admits no steping back. I insist (considering that very soon, on January 1, 2007, the time to silence in my present office shall come) that this Court cannot let itself stop or regress its own jurisprudence regarding imperative law (jus cogens) within this scope of protection of the human being, regarding both substantive and procedural law.