44 Venezuela". The State further alleged that “[the] President has been very clear when he asserted that his critical message regarding some of the media was not addressed to the reporters and employees working in such media, but to the political positions of the media owners". 154. The Court deems that from the evidence furnished in support of the already mentioned statements,107 it does not spring the existence of such public appeals “that demonstrate a profound and dynamic condemnation […] from the instances of the Public Power [on occasion of] the acts committed by private individuals against some media workers ”. In the context of the facts of the case at hand, it is possible to consider that the appropriate conduct of the high-ranking public officials towards the attacks of reporters, by virtue of their role of communicators within a democratic society, would have been a public statement of disapproval of such acts. 155. Notwithstanding the foregoing, though it is true that there is a risk intrinsic in the journalistic activity, the risky situations the people that work for such media would normally face could be worse if that media is the object of official speeches that may provoke or suggest actions or be interpreted by public officials or sectors of the society as directions, incitements or any other form of authorizations or support, for the commission of acts that jeopardize or violate the life, personal security or other rights of the reporters or of those who exercise their right to freedom of expression. 156. The Court considers it does not spring from the content of such speeches or declarations, that the attacks or violent acts against the alleged victims have been authorized, incited, directed or ordered by state agents, public officials, and groups of people or specific individuals. Moreover, such statements do not either suggest that such officials undertook as acts of themselves, or that they “justified” or “considered legitimate” or supported or congratulated, the actions that jeopardized or caused damage to the alleged victims, after the attacks committed against them.108 157. However, the fact that in several official declarations of the highest authority, Globovisión, specially its owners and executives, were related to terrorist activities, plans of political destabilization or the coup d' État of 2002, placed those who work for this particular media in a position of greater vulnerability towards the State and certain sectors of the society 107 Cf., video identified as “Statements of State Officials" (appendix to the response to the petition, marked as “A.15 I” and “A.15. II”). 108 In the case of Diplomatic and Consular Staff in Tehran, the International Court of Justice noted that the religious leader of Irán, the Ayatollah Khomeini, had made several public declarations inveighing the United States as responsible for all his country’s problems, which would appear that the Ayatollah Khomeini was giving utterance to the general resentment felt by supporters of the revolution at the admission of the former Shah to the United States. It also noted that a spokesman for the militants, in explaining their actions afterwards, did expressly referred to a message issued by the Ayatollah by which he called the students and pupils to expand with all their might the attacks against United States and Israel, so they may force the United States to return the deposed and criminal shah and to condemn his great plot Nevertheless, the Tribunal deemed that” it would be going to far to interpret such general declarations of the Ayatollah of the people or students of Iran as amounting to an authorization from the State to undertake the specific operation of invading and seizing the United States Embassy. To do so would, indeed, conflict with the assertions of the militants themselves who are reported to have claimed credit for having devised and carried out the plan to occupy the Embassy. Again, congratulations after the events, such as those reportedly telephoned to the militants by Ayatollah on the actual evening of the attack and other subsequent statements of official approval, though highly significant in another context shortly to be considered, do not alter the initially independent and unofficial character of the militants’ attack on the Embassy”. Cf. ICJ, United States Diplomatic and Consular Staff in Tehran (United States of America v. Iran), Judgment of 24 May 1980, I.C.J. Reports 1980, p. 3, párr. 59.