-13adversely affecting the limits to their participation established in the Convention or the exercise of the Court’s jurisdiction. Once the Commission has initiated the proceedings, the possibility of presenting requests and arguments autonomously before the Court includes that of alleging the violation of other articles of the Convention that were not contained in the application, based on the facts set out in the latter. Nevertheless, this should not affect the purpose of the application or violate or infringe the right to defense of the State, which is given the procedural opportunities to respond to the allegations of the Commission and the representatives at all stages of the proceedings. In the final instance, it is for the Court to decide, in each case, on the admissibility of allegations of this nature in order to safeguard the procedural equality of the parties. […] This Court is empowered to make its own assessment of the facts of the case and to decide on aspects of law that have not been alleged by the parties, based on the iura novit curia principle. In other words, although the application provides the factual framework for the proceedings, it does not limit the powers of the Court to determine the facts of the case, based on the evidence submitted, on supervening facts, on complementary and contextual information in the case file and also on well-known or public facts that the Court considers pertinent to include as part of these facts.8 56. Therefore, the possibility of submitting requests and arguments autonomously to the Court includes the possibility of submitting their own requests and arguments with regard to reparations, based on the facts set out in the application, without this affecting the latter or violating or infringing the right to defense of the State, which is able to respond to the allegations of the Commission and the representatives at all stages of the proceedings. The fact that the Commission defers to the requests of the representatives is a procedural option that does not affect the right to defense of the State or the corresponding assessment of the Court. * * * 57. Finally, regarding the legitimation of the representatives in the case before the Court, the State indicated that: In the application brief, the Commission provided information on the representation of the victims’ next of kin and about the organizations that represent them and advised that the Commission would assume the representation of the victims whose next of kin were not represented by the said organizations. The brief with requests, arguments and evidence submitted by the victims’ representatives indicates the names of the persons they represent; however, only some of these names coincide with the information that the Commission provided in the application in accordance with the obligatory requirements of Article 33(3) of the Rules of Procedure. According to the Rules of Procedure, the Commission plays the role of the Attorney General’s Office (ministerio público) in the inter-American system and, consequently, in the public interest, assumes the procedural representation of the victims who have not been fully identified or located when the application is presented. This is the case of the following persons whose name and next of kin were not indicated in the application and who appear only in the brief with requests, arguments and evidence: ARIEL DULLIS DIAZ DELGADO, WILSON UBERTO FUENTES MARIMON, CELIMO HURTADO, ANGEL BENITO JIMENEZ JULIO, JUAN BAUTISTA MEZA SALGADO, MIGUEL ANTONIO PEREZ RAMOS, JORGE DAVID MARTINEZ MORENO and MIGUEL ANGEL GUTIERREZ ARRIETA. In other words, even if they have granted express powers to the representatives, their appearance in the proceedings is belated, and it is only based on the need to protect their interests that the Commission is able to represent them. Since the participation of the alleged victims, their next of kin or representatives does not make them a party to the proceedings before the Court, they are not allowed to 8 Cf. Case of the “Mapiripán Massacre”, supra note 7, paras. 58 and 59.