of this instrument based on Articles 8.a and 13, as spelled out in Article 19.6. Accordingly, the Commission is not competent to examine alleged violations of Articles 3, 6, or 7 of the Protocol of San Salvador. 42. As regards the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination and Convention 111 of the International Labor Organization, it should be noted that the IACHR is not competent to examine alleged violations of the rights guaranteed in these legal instruments. However, in light of Article 29 of the American Convention, the IACHR may look to them for guidance in interpreting the international obligations freely assumed by the State. 43. The IACHR is competent ratione temporis considering that the facts are alleged to have taken place after the Brazilian State assumed the commitment to respect human rights, as it ratified the American Convention on September 25, 1992. 44. The IACHR is competent ratione loci considering that the facts in the complaint are alleged to have taken place in Brazilian territory. B. Admissibility Requirements 1. Exhaustion of domestic remedies 45. The petitioner submitted the petition to the IACHR on December 8, 2003, alleging that it contained a complaint based on Article 46.2.c of the American Convention, which is an exception to the exhaustion of domestic remedies requirement based on unwarranted delay in reaching a decision. It is noted that the petition was filed when the judicial action in Brazil had already seen three years go by without any movement by the Judicial branch of São Paulo. 46. The petitioner indicates that notwithstanding the evidence in the record for finding the accused liable in the trial court, the verdict was not a finding of liability, and that the appellate motion awaited distribution to one of the Criminal Chambers of the Court of Appeals of São Paulo for three years. 47. Moreover, the State did not controvert the fact of the delay, it merely indicated that the appellate motion was heard (more than three years after the submission of arguments by both parties), and that the decision below was modified, notwithstanding the material error, subsequently modified through the amendmentof-judgment process known as embargos de declaração by the judge above, on extinguishing the State’s punitive claim, when it argued prescription of a crime which, under the Constitution, is imprescriptible. 48. The victims are not obligated to bring an action for damages in the situation described in the instant case. They had not filed a civil action, so it would not have been joined to the criminal action, for under Brazilian law, because they are separate actions that will be heard by different judges, each with its own procedural dynamic. This means that the alleged victims’ effort to secure judicial protection from the Brazilian State is sufficient with a criminal action. The alleged victims have the power to file a civil action for damages, yet they must necessarily file a criminal action, according to Law 7,716/89 (Caó Law) to have the perpetrator of the racist act punished, for the Constitution of Brazil, at Article 5(XLII), establishes that racism is an imprescriptible crime not subject to bond, and the law cited above is the regulatory provision, which describes the various criminal definitions of racism. The following provisions are relevant to the instant case: