60 203. c) the proceedings in the case “contain serious defects that vitiate them beyond remedy, and the judge in the case can and should declare them nullified ex officio. As one of the branches of government, the Judiciary has an obligation to ensure due process and to adopt the necessary means to that end”; d) so long as Decree-Law No 25,659, which classifies aggravated terrorism as treason, and Decree-Law No. 25,744, which establishes the procedural rules for treason cases, remain on the law books, the human rights guaranteed in articles 1(1), 8, 20 and 25 of the Convention, and the obligations set forth in Article 2 thereof will be violated; and e) as part of the obligation to ensure human rights, the States Parties are to adopt laws for effective protection of the rights and freedoms established in the Convention. As the Commission pointed out, “this obligation implies positive action, in that States are obliged to adopt new measures; it also implies negative action, in that States are obliged to abolish those laws that are incompatible with the Convention.” Arguments of the State: a) “exceptional criminal laws had to be enforced to cope with the irrational violence of terrorist organizations,” one of which was the MRTA. Through Decree-Law No. 25,418, the State instituted the National Emergency and Reconstruction Government”, its immediate aim being “to pacify the country with a legal system capable of ensuring that drastic sanctions would be applied to terrorists,” the ultimate goal being domestic tranquility and order. This was the context in which Decree-Laws Nos. 25,475 and 25,659 were promulgated; b) the application must be dismissed as unfounded: the State “never failed to observe the minimum judicial guarantees of due process and judicial protection, although it acknowledges that the law it enforced was stiff and drastic and considered to be one of the essentials that Peru had in its arsenal to combat the subversive organizations that were destroying the country;” c) internally, that Peruvian legislation has never been challenged and is still in force; and d) the laws under discussion were in effect “long before the detention and prosecution of the citizens involved. […] Nevertheless, once detained and processed, they had available to them the minimum judicial guarantees that international human rights instruments require in exceptional emergency cases.” 204. As this Court has pointed out, there can be no doubt that the State has the right and the duty to guarantee its own security. Nor is there any question that violations of the law occur in every society. But no matter how terrible certain actions may be and regardless of how guilty those in custody on suspicion of having