77 Ordinary Action filed by the next of kin, which is linked to access to justice and to the right to seek and receive information enshrined in Article 13 of the American Convention. 202. Finally, the Court has also established that in cases of violations of human rights, the State authorities cannot resort to mechanisms such as official secret or confidentiality of the information, or reasons of public interest or national security, to refuse to supply the information required by the judicial or administrative authorities in charge of the ongoing investigation or pending procedures.307 Moreover, when it comes to the investigation of punishable facts, the decision to qualify the information as secretive or to refuse to hand it over cannot stem solely from a State organ whose members are charged with committing the wrongful acts.308 In the same sense, the final decision on the existence of the requested documentation cannot be left to its discretion. D. Legal actions and access to information 203. The Court can rule on the State’s actions regarding the presentation of information only for facts that occurred after December 10, 1998, the date from which the Court has jurisdiction on the alleged violations of the Convention attributable to Brazil (supra para. 18). 1. Ordinary Action No. 82.00.24682-5 204. When the ratione temporis jurisdiction of the Court commenced, on December 10, 1998, after 16 years in proceedings, the Ordinary Action was in process (supra paras. 188 to 191). In this context, on April 9, 1999, the State, via the Attorney General’s Office of the Union, presented a brief, wherein it indicated that, as a consequence of a new direction taken due to the consolidation of the democratic regime, the Law No. 9.140/95 was promulgated, which recognized as deceased the persons disappeared in the period between September 2, 1961, and August 15, 1979, and that the Special Commission was created, commissioned to, among its other tasks, carry out the efforts to locate the bodies of the disappeared persons. It indicated that, in addition, “given that the efforts of the Federal Government by means of the Special Commission […] have been proven […], no excuse is conceivable, if it had available information necessary for locating the burial places, to omit this information in the face of the natural and unquestionable right of the actors.” Similarly, it considered that “given that there is no minimal evidence regarding the existence an alleged report on the Guerrilha do Araguaia, the Union is not able to attend the decision […] in which there was a request for presentation of the mentioned document, and […] that it doesn’t even know if it even existed in the past.”309 It concluded that the Ordinary Action filed was not justified given that the arguments of the actors had been attended to with the recognition of the deceased persons and the ensuing issuance of death certificates by means of Law No. 9.140/95, and that the only specific provision to remain outstanding, the localization of the graves, 307 Cf. Case of Myrna Mack Chang, supra note 302, para. 180; Case of Tiu Tojín v. Guatemala. Merits, Reparations and Costs. Judgment of November 26, 2008. Series C No. 190, para. 77, and Case of Radilla Pacheco, supra note 24, para 258. 308 309 Cf. Case of Myrna Mack Chang, supra note 302, para. 181. Brief of the Untion of April 9, 1999, addressed to the Federal Judge of First Instance (case file of annexes to the application, tome I, folio 120).