45 ii) Impartiality 167. The Court has held that impartiality demands subjective guarantees by the judge, as well as sufficient objective guarantees to quell any doubt the party or the community might entertain as to the judge’s lack of impartiality.177 The Court has clarified, moreover, that such challenges are a procedural means of protecting the right to be heard by an impartial body. 178 168. The guarantee of impartiality implies that members of the court have no direct interest in, a preestablished viewpoint on, or a preference for one or another of the parties, that they are not involved in the dispute179 and that they inspire the necessary trust and confidence in the parties to the case and in the citizens of a democratic society. 180 Lack of impartiality cannot be assumed, but must be assessed on a case-by-case basis. 169. In the case at hand, the Court assures that the alleged victims at no time asked for the judges on the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces to be disqualified.181 Nor did the alleged victims petition in the domestic jurisdiction for the judges on the National Chamber of Criminal Cassation or the Supreme Court to be recused, nor did they adduce any evidence in the current proceedings to demonstrate partiality by these judges while the case was being processed, for any subjective reason. Furthermore, there is no evidence that the functional hierarchy of the members of the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces interfered with their impartiality in this specific case. The Court deems, accordingly, that insufficient evidence is available to conclude that the judges who participated in trying the process lacked impartiality. B. Right to be assisted by legal counsel of one’s own choosing B.1 Arguments of the parties and of the Commission 170. The Commission argued, “article 97 of the Code of Military Justice [did] not grant the alleged victims the right to an attorney, but allow[ed] them to be defended by an active-duty or retired military officer. The right to be defended by an attorney was addressed in article 252 of the Code of Military Justice, once the accused had delivered a statement before the court.” In this sense, “bearing in mind that the nature and the activities of an effective, technically qualified defense necessitate […] the services of a legal professional, the Commission deem[ed] that the restriction imposed by the [Code of Military Justice] led to a dual violation of the right enshrined in article 8(2)(d) of the Convention: [f]irst, that the [alleged] victims were unable to have “legal counsel of [their] own choosing,” but instead were assigned a person from the armed forces, someone under the military chain of command 177 Cfr. Case of Apitz Barbera et al. (“First Court of Administrative Disputes”) v. Venezuela., par. 56, and Case of J. v. Peru, par. 282. 178 Cfr. Case of Apitz Barbera et al. (“First Court of Administrative Disputes”) v. Venezuela, par. 64, and Case of J. v. Peru, par. 282. 179 Cfr. Case of Palamara Iribarne v. Chile, par. 146. 180 Cfr. Case of Herrera Ulloa v. Costa Rica. Preliminary Objections, Merits, Reparations and Costs. Judgment of July 2, 2004. Series C No. 107, par. 171. 181 The defense team in the domestic procedure also petitioned the courts to nullify the actions by one of the judges on the Military Court of Criminal Investigation who was not psychologically competent to perform these duties, and the National Chamber of Criminal Cassation held that the clinical history noted by the defense was not sufficient to demonstrate that the judge was physically or psychologically unable to conduct the investigation of the case. In any event, this claim is unrelated to the impartiality of the judge in the specific case, as clarified in paragraph 162 of this judgment.