21 74. The Court recalls that in the instant case, its role is to determine, as an international court of human rights exercising its contentious jurisdiction, the State's responsibility under the American Convention for the alleged violations and not the responsibility of Globovisión, or of its managers, shareholders or employees, in relation to certain facts or historical incidents that occurred in Venezuela, nor even their role or performance as a social media. The Court does not determine the rights of Globovisión, in its capacity as company, corporation or legal entity. Even if it is true that Globovisión or its personnel has committed the acts that the State understands they did, this does not provide a justification for failing to comply with the State’s obligation to respect and guarantee human rights.35 Dissent and different opinions or ideas are consubstantial to the pluralism that must rule in a democratic society. 75. In the final written arguments, the representatives presented a series of considerations and allegations about “a campaign of intimidation and retaliation carried out by the State […] against the Court, the [Commission], the [alleged] victims and […] their representatives, on occasion of the hearing", in reference to expressions and statements of state agents regarding the alleged victims and the videos published by the state television station. They allege that it forms part of “a State policy implemented from the high spheres of power in order to intimidate and discredit, both at the national and international level, this case and to continue with a policy of retaliation and harassment against the victims for having exercise their right to petition [before the bodies of the system]”. In such regards, according to Article 44 of the Convention, any person or group of persons may lodge petitions with the Inter-American System; therefore the effective exercise of such right implies that no act of retaliation may be performed against them. States Parties must guarantee, in compliance with their treaty obligations, the right to make petitions during all the stages of the proceedings before international courts. D) Alleged violations 76. The Commission as well as the representatives alleged that the State is responsible for the violation of the freedom to seek, receive and impart information and ideas (Article 13(1) of the Convention). 77. The Commission argued that the acts described in the application constituted restrictions “to the essential content of the right to freedom of expression, which is, to freely seek, receive and impart information, under the terms of Article 13(1) of the Convention", in relation to the obligation to respect rights enshrined in Article 1(1) therein, though it did not specify to the detriment of whom such restriction was imposed nor it determined the facts that would have generated the violation; otherwise, it referred, in general, to the "incidents described in the section of considerations of facts of the application". In the application, the Commission asserted that the facts occurred during a period of institutional and political conflict, in which “an environment of insults, violence and ongoing threat was generated" against the employees of the social media, mainly during times of greater social and political conflicts in the country. The Commission alleged that said context, speeches or statements made by the highest state authorities, among which the Commission indicated 15 statements made by the President of the Republic and one made by the Ministry of Domestic Affairs and Justice, helped to create an environment of intolerance and social bias, incompatible with the duty to prevent human rights violations 35 Cf. mutatis mutandi, ECHR, Özgür Gündem v. Turkey, Judgment of 16 March 2000, Reports of Judgments and Decisions 2000-III, para. 45.