30 B.3 Regulation of the right to appeal the judgment of high-ranking officials104 within comparative jurisdictions 89. Based on the arguments of the parties and given the importance of the controversy for various other citizens and regional States, the Court will now refer to comparative law on the subject with the goal of clarifying the scope and content of the right to appeal the judgment, as applied to high-ranking officials, namely: a) the United Nations Human Rights Committee; b) the ECHR; and c) the practice of the States in the region on the matter. B.3.1 The Human Rights Committee of the United Nations 90. The United Nations Human Rights Committee has expressly noted, in paragraph 47 of General Comment No. 32, that: “Article 14, paragraph 5105 [of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (hereinafter “ICCPR”)] is violated not only if the decision by the court of first instance is final, but also where a conviction imposed by an appeal court or a court of final instance, following acquittal by a lower court, cannot be reviewed by a higher court. Where the highest court of a country acts as first and only instance, the absence of any right to review by a higher tribunal is not offset by the fact of being tried by the supreme tribunal of the State party concerned; rather, such a system is incompatible with the Covenant, unless the State party concerned has made a reservation to this effect.”106 91. Similarly, the Human Rights Committee has stated in its decisions that the right to appeal the judgment must be guaranteed regardless of the rank of the accused person. Thus, “[a]lthough [a] State party's legislation provides in certain circumstances for the trial of an individual, because of his position, by a higher court than would normally be the case, this circumstance alone cannot impair the defendant's right to review his conviction and sentence by a court.”107 104 The domestic regulations of each State define and determine who the authorities considered high-ranking public officials and/or politicians for that purpose. However, within these high-ranking authorities, the following are included in a general manner: high-ranking officials such as: the President of the Republic, the Vice-President, Representatives, Senators, Members of the National Congress, Supreme Court Justices, Judges of the Constitutional Court, the Electoral judges, Ministers, Secretaries of State, the Attorney General, Prosecutors, the Ombudsman, the Comptroller General of the Republic, among other officials of similar classification. 105 UN, International Convenant on Civil and Political Rights, December 16, 1966, Article 14(5)“Everyone convicted of a crime shall have the right to his conviction and sentence being reviewed by a higher tribunal according to law,” available at: http://www2.ohchr.org/spanish/law/ccpr.htm. 106 UN, Human Rights Committee, General Comment No. 32, Article 14: Right to equality before courts and tribunals and right to a fair trial, U.N. Doc. CCPR/C/GC/32, August 23, 2007, para. 47, available at: http://www1.umn.edu/humanrts/hrcommittee/S-gencom32.pdf. Nevertheless, it is important to note that the Human Rights Committee has noted that in paragraph 46, paragraph 5 of Article 14, does not apply to any other proceeding that does not form part of an appeal. Moreover, it is important to note that Suriname did not establish a reservation in regard to Article 14, subparagraph 5 of the ICCPR. Cf. UN, Declarations and Reservations of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, available at: http://treaties.un.org/Pages/ViewDetails.aspx?src=TREATY&mtdsg_no=IV-4&chapter=4&lang=en. 107 UN, Human Rights Committee, Case of Jesús Terrón c. Spain, Communication No. 1073/2002, UN Doc. CCPR/C/82/D1073/2002, November 15, 2004, para. 7(4). The Committee has ratified the same criteria in two other similar cases, where based on ancillary jurisdiction, judgments were carried out in a single instance before the Supreme Court of Spain and the Committee decided that such procedures were inconsistent with Article 14 paragraph 5 of the Covenant. Cf Case of Luis Hens Serean and Juan Ramón Corujo Rodríguez V. Spain, Communication No. 1351-1352/2005, U.N. Doc. CCPR/C/92/D/1351-1352/2005, March 25, 2008, paras. 9(2) and 9(3), and Case of Luis Oliveró Capellades V. Spain, Communication No. 1211/2003, U.N. Doc. CCPR/C/87/D/1211/2003 (2006), July 11, 2006, para. 7.