80 139. The Commission considered that the State should pay the costs and expenses arising from processing the case in both the domestic and the international jurisdictions. Arguments of the representatives 140. The representatives stated that costs should cover: a) The fees of the national lawyers who advised and represented the Carpio Arrivillaga family in the legal proceedings for seven years, and which amount to one hundred and fifty thousand United States dollars. Also, Martha Arrivillaga de Carpio made three trips to attend the three hearings of the case before the Commission, with a total cost of four thousand dollars, and b) before Court, United The expenses of CEJIL for litigating the case for almost ten years the Inter-American Commission, and then before the Inter-American which amount to fourteen thousand eight hundred and eighty-seven States dollars. 141. The representatives stated that, in order to differentiate between the costs that the Court recognizes to the family or families, and those that it grants to their legal representatives, it should expressly distinguish between them. Arguments of the State 142. The State did not refer to costs and expenses. Considerations of the Court 143. As the Court has indicated on previous occasions,141 costs and expenses are included in the concept of reparation embodied in Article 63(1) of the American Convention, because the measures taken by the victims or their representatives in order to obtain justice at the domestic and the international level, imply expenditure that must be compensated when the State’s international responsibility has been declared in a judgment against it. Regarding reimbursement, the Court must prudently assess their scope, which includes the expenses incurred before the authorities of the domestic jurisdiction, and also those incurred during the proceedings before the inter-American system, taking into account the validation of the expenses incurred, the circumstances of the specific case and the nature of the international jurisdiction for the protection of human rights. This assessment may be based on the principle of fairness and by taking into account the expenses indicated and substantiated by the parties, providing the amount is reasonable 144. With regard to recognition of costs and expenses, legal assistance to the victim does not start merely at the reparations stage, but it begins before the domestic judicial organs and continues in the successive instances of the interAmerican system for the protection of human rights; namely, in the proceedings before the Commission and before the Court. Consequently, for these purposes, the concept of costs includes those that correspond to access to justice at the national 141 Cf. Case of Tibi, supra note 11, para. 268; Case of the “Juvenile Reeducation Institute”, supra note 11, para. 328; and Case of Ricardo Canese, supra note 11, para. 212.