protections, the State notes that the Supreme Council was vested with the discretion to determine which evidence was relevant, and that this decision was not subject to appeal. The State further notes that such discretion was not unique to military tribunals, but was a matter of national criminal procedural law, and that the petitioners’ claims in this regard had been considered and rejected by both the Supreme Council and the National Chamber of Criminal Casation. Finally, the State indicates that the alleged victims are not claiming innocence, and do not allege the lack of independence or impartiality of any of the magistrates at any of the levels of the proceedings against them. 42. Consistent with the foregoing position, the State argues that petition 12.167 is inadmissible for three main reasons. First, the State maintains that the central claims placed before the Commission were brought before and decided by the competent national judicial authorities. Accordingly, the State indicates that the alleged victims are seeking that the Commission review sentences issued by the national courts acting within their spheres of competence and in accordance with due process–an objective outside the competence set forth in the American Convention. Second, with respect to the requirement that domestic remedies be invoked and exhausted in order for the Commission to admit a petition, the State notes that the petition only satisfies this requirement insofar as the alleged victims challenged their convictions, and the constitutionality of the norms of the Code of Military Justice. The State argues that any claims concerning compensation and Article 10 of the American Convention are inadmissible for failure to invoke and exhaust domestic remedies as required under Article 46 of the Convention. The alleged victims failed to invoke or exhaust available remedies with respect to their allegedly unduly prolonged preventive detention, and failed to seek compensation for the time they were detained in excess of their prison sentences, thereby rendering such claims inadmissible. Third, the State contends that, in any case, the petitioners have failed to allege facts that could characterize a violation of the American Convention. IV. ANALYSIS OF ADMISSIBILITY A. Competence of the Commission ratione personae, ratione materiae, ratione temporis and ratione loci 43. In accordance with the terms of Article 44 of the American Convention, the petitioners have standing to present a petition before the Commission. The petition under study indicates that the named victims were subject to the jurisdiction of the Argentine State at the time of the alleged facts. Argentina has been a member State of the Organization of American States since its ratification of the OAS Charter in 1948, and as such subject to the jurisdiction of the Commission in respect of individual complaints since that competence was established by statute in 1965 with reference to the terms of the American Declaration of the Rights and Duties of Man. Argentina has been subject to the Commission’s jurisdiction under the terms of the American Convention since it deposited its instrument of ratification on September 5, 1984. Accordingly, the Commission has the competence ratione personae to examine the claims presented. 44. With respect to the question of competence ratione temporis, the Commission notes that the claims raised relate in the first stage to the American Declaration, and as from Argentina’s ratification of the American Convention, to the latter. Neither party has questioned the Commission’s jurisdiction in this respect. 1 With respect to the claims concerning the first stage, it may be reiterated that for any State that has yet to ratify the American Convention, the fundamental rights it undertakes to uphold as a Party to the OAS Charter are those set forth in the American Declaration, which constitutes a source of international obligation.2 The Commission’s Statute and Rules of Procedure provide additional norms concerning the exercise of its jurisdiction in this regard. That jurisdiction was in effect atthe time of the first facts alleged by 1 While the State maintains that the petitioners’ claims concerning the prohibition against pressure for the purpose of self-incrimination fail because the American Convention was not applicable at the time of the defendants’ initial declarations, and the American Declaration contains no express protection in this regard, what the State is sustaining is that the petitioners have failed to state facts tending to characterize a violation. The State has not argued that the Commission lacks competence ratione temporis over the petition. 2 IACtHR, Advisory Opinion OC-10/89, July 14, 1989, "Interpretation of the American Declaration of the Rights and Duties of Man within the Framework of Article 64 of the American Convention on Human Rights," Ser. A Nº 10, paras. 43 - 46. 8