-137the operational results obtained, strictly respecting human rights,
humanitarian principles, constitutional mandates and legal procedures.
Findings of the Court
264. In this section the Court will determine the measures of satisfaction, which
are not of a financial nature, that seek to repair the non-pecuniary damage, and will
order measures of a public scope or repercussion.262 These measures have special
relevance in this case owing to the extreme gravity of the facts.
(a)
Obligation of the State to investigate the facts of the case and
identify, prosecute and sanction those responsible
265. The Court has established in this judgment that the investigations conducted
by Colombia into the Pueblo Bello massacre which took place on January 14, 1990,
have not complied with the standards of access to justice and judicial protection
established in the American Convention (supra para. 169 to 212).
266. The Court reiterates that the State is obliged to combat this situation of
impunity by all available means, since it fosters the chronic repetition of human
rights violations and the total defenselessness of the victims and their next of kin,
who have the right to know the truth about the facts.263 When this right to the truth
is recognized and exercised in a specific situation, it constitutes an important
measure of reparation, and is a reasonable expectation of the victims that the State
must satisfy.264
267. In light of the above, the State must implement forthwith the necessary
measures to activate and complete effectively, within a reasonable time, the
investigation to identify all the masterminds and perpetrators of the massacre and
those responsible, by act or omission for the failure to comply with the State’s
obligation to ensure the violated rights. The State should complete the criminal
proceedings in the ordinary criminal jurisdiction, in a way that allows all the facts to
be clarified and those responsible to be sanctioned, and ensures that the sentences
that have already been imposed are served. The results of the proceedings must be
publicized by the State, so that Colombian society may know the truth about the
facts of this case.
268. To comply with the obligation to investigate and sanction those responsible in
the instant case, Colombia must: (a) remove all the obstacles, de facto and de jure,
that maintain impunity; (b) use all available means to expedite the investigation and
the respective proceedings, and (c) grant adequate guarantees of security to the
next of kin of the persons disappeared and deprived of life, investigators, witnesses,
human rights defenders, judicial employees, prosecutors and other agents of the
justice system, as well as to the former and actual inhabitants of Pueblo Bello.
262
Cf. Case of Blanco Romero et al., supra note 10, para. 93; Case of García Asto and Ramírez
Rojas, supra note 10, para. 276, and Case of Gómez Palomino, supra note 10, para. 136.
263
Cf. Case of Gómez Palomino, supra note 10, para. 76; Case of the “Mapiripán Massacre”, supra
note 7, para. 297, and Case of the Moiwana Community, supra note 7, para. 203.
264
Cf. Case of Blanco Romero et al., supra note 10, para. 95; Case of the “Mapiripán Massacre”,
supra note 7, para. 297, and Case of the Moiwana Community, supra note 7, para. 204.
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