78 that] civil rights, as constitutional rights of the Panamanians, were never suspended.”(This translator's version of the quotation.) 94. By virtue of the fact that a state of emergency in Panama where some of the guarantees established in the American Convention would have been suspended was not declared, this Court deems inappropriate the allegation by the State concerning the presumed existence of such state of emergency, in respect of which it shall analyse the alleged violation of such articles of said Convention as relate to the protected rights claimed in the application, without regard to the rule applicable to the states of exception, that is, Article 27 of the American Convention. * * * 95. Both, at the public hearing, and in the course of its final arguments, the Commission alleged the applicability of the Additional Protocol to the American Convention on Human Rights in the Area of Economic, Social and Cultural Rights “Protocol of San Salvador” (hereinafter the “Protocol of San Salvador”) to the instant case, based on the argument that, through the application of Law 25, the State affected the exercise of the right to organise and join trade unions freely (one of whose expressions is the right to strike, which is guaranteed as per Article 8 of said Protocol); that the Protocol of San Salvador entered into force on November 16, 1999, but that Panama signed said instrument in 1988, before the events in the instant case; that, by signing the Protocol, the State made the commitment to abstain from perpetrating acts that would oppose the objective and purpose of the treaty; that, according to the general principles of international law, the obligations of the States arise well in advance of the moment that they ratify an international covenant, and that in this case Panama is liable for the violation committed by its agents after the signing of the Protocol of San Salvador, since the actions of the State contravened the objective and purpose of said instrument, as regards the trade union rights of the workers dismissed. 96. In the course of the same procedural instances, the State pointed out that the Protocol of San Salvador could not be applied to the instant case, and that the Commission intended to add a new fact to the application, which is the violation of Articles 1 and 8 of said Protocol; that the Commission is requesting to the Court the retroactive application of the Protocol of San Salvador and that it intends to put into practice rules that had not entered into force at the time of the passing of Law 25, in addition to the fact that Panama had not ratified said instrument at that time, and that Article 28 of the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties establishes the nonretroactivity of treaties, and that the provisions of an instrument do not bind the parties in relation to any acts or facts which would have taken place before the date of its entry into force. 97. The Court has referred before to its competence to apply human rights treaties other than the American Convention. In this sense it has felt that, while it has ample powers to hear about human rights violations, the latter must be referred to the rights protected by the Convention, except for cases where another international instrument ratified by the State grants it the competence to hear cases of violation to the rights protected by that same instrument.51 Thus, in the Bámaca51 cfr. Las Palmeras Case, Preliminary Objections. Judgment of February 4, 2000. Series C N° 67, para. 34.