293. For their part, several bodies for the protection of human rights established by the United Nations treaties have expressed their concern with regard to the Amnesty Law, stressing the need to review, modify, annul or amend it, 473 and emphasizing that the 2000 decision of the Constitutional Chamber (supra para. 278) had not resulted in the re-opening of the investigations.474 At the domestic level the Ombudsman considered that the Law of General Amnesty for the Consolidation of Peace was a norm of positive law that seriously violated the constitutional legal order and that it also violated the fundamental principles of international human rights law.475 294. In the instant case, it is almost 20 years since the investigation into the massacres of El Mozote and nearby places was dismissed and the case file closed as a result of the application of the Law of General Amnesty for the Consolidation of Peace, without any response to the repeated requests to re-open the proceedings by the representatives of the victims. The 2000 decision of the Constitutional Chamber (supra para. 279) has had no effect in the instant case and, 12 years after its issue, it seems illusory that it will result in any real possibility for the investigation to be reopened. In this regard, expert witness Menéndez Leal stated that “this benefit has made its influence felt because, from the perspective of the agents of the system of justice, it has created the perception that, based on this amnesty law, justice cannot be administered”; consequently, “in the Salvadoran justice apparatus, it is understood that the 1993 benefit has extinguished the responsibility, both intellectual and material, for the events that occurred in the context of the conflict and, as result, the agents of justice do not apply the exceptions included in that judgment,” except in isolated cases.476 295. Thus, the approval by the Legislative Assembly of the Law of General Amnesty for the Consolidation of Peace and its subsequent application in this case by the Second First Instance Court of San Francisco Gotera, on the one hand, is contrary to the letter and spirit of the Peace occurred during the armed conflict.” Expert opinion provided by Salvador Eduardo Menéndez Leal before the InterAmerican Court during the public hearing held on April 23, 2012. 473 Cf. Human Rights Committee, Concluding Observations of the Human Rights Committee: El Salvador, U.N. Doc. CCPR/C/79/Add.34, 18 April 1994, paras. 7 and 12, available at: http://www.unhchr.ch/tbs/doc.nsf/ 0/013a57379e3ccd57c12563ed0046d4c4?Opendocument; Concluding Observations of the Human Rights Committee: El Salvador, U.N. Doc. CCPR/CO/78/SLV, 22 August 2003, para. 6, available at: http://www.unhchr.ch/tbs/doc.nsf/(Symbol)/CCPR.CO.78.SLV.Sp?Opendocument; Concluding Observations of the Human Rights Committee: El Salvador, U.N. Doc. CCPR/C/SLV/CO/6, 18 November 2010, para. 5, available at: http://daccess-dds-ny.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/G10/467/01/PDF/G1046701.pdf?OpenElement; Report of the Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances, Mission to El Salvador, U.N. Doc. A/HRC/7/2/Add.2, 26 of October 2007, para. 69 (evidence file, tome X, annex 11 to the pleadings and motions brief, folio 6719), and Committee against Torture, Concluding Observations of the Committee against Torture with regard to El Salvador, U.N. Doc. CAT/C/SLV/CO/2, 9 December 2009, para. 15 (evidence file, tome X, annex 12 to the pleadings and motions brief, folios 6729 to 6730). 474 Cf. Human Rights Committee, Concluding Observations of the Human Rights Committee: El Salvador, U.N. Doc. CCPR/C/SLV/CO/6, 18 November 2010, para. 5, available at: http://daccess-dds-ny.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/G10/ 467/01/PDF/G1046701.pdf?OpenElement. See also, Expert opinion provided by Salvador Eduardo Menéndez Leal before the Inter-American Court during the public hearing held on April 23, 2012. 475 At the time, the Ombudsman considered that since the Law of General Amnesty for the Consolidation of Peace annulled absolutely the rights to the truth, to justice and to the reparation of the victims of crimes such as the massacre of peasants, extrajudicial executions, enforced disappearances, torture, the systematic murder of public officials and even judicial corruption, it is a norm of positive law that gravely violates the constitutional legal order and that, in the same way, affects the fundamental principles of international human rights law. Cf. Special report of the Ombudsman on the massacres of civilian population by State agents in the context of the internal armed conflict in El Salvador from 1980 to 1992, of March 7, 2005 (evidence file, tome III, annex 4 to the submission of the case, folio 1388), and Amicus curiae brief presented by the Ombudsman of El Salvador (merits file, tome III, folio 1256). 476 Cf. Expert opinion provided by Salvador Eduardo Menéndez Leal before the Inter-American Court during the public hearing held on April 23, 2012, in which he explained that it was only in the case of the death of the Jesuit priests and their two collaborators that it was declared that the 1993 Amnesty Law did not apply, but, in any case, the prescription was applied; in other words, another legal mechanism that gave rise to similar effects. Another case is that of the judge of Tecoluca in the department of San Vicente, who, is hearing the case of a massacre in San Francisco Angulo, and “required the prosecutor to investigate the case; but the case has almost been archived.” Also, see Expert report provided by Ricardo Alberto Iglesias Herrera before the Inter-American Court in the Case of Contreras et al. v. El Salvador of May 12, 2011 (evidence file, tome X, annex 15 to the pleadings and motions brief, folio 6841). 97