its members, in general or on specific matters, established in writing in the collegiate ruling or in the individual opinions. 42. What the Court should establish with the formality and objectivity characteristic of a tribunal, is the need to summon a hearing based on the lack of, insufficiency, or extreme complexity of the elements of judgment available for the sole and exclusive purpose of this stage: interpret the judgment. If this could not be carried out with the available elements, it would be necessary to hold the hearing, which in no case would seek to revise the aspects of merits and modify the judgment. If the interpretation could be made with said elements –both the judgment itself on merits as well as the arguments of the parties with regard to the interpretation—it would not be necessary to hold one. In this case the Court could decide considering their written contributions. Of course, I am referring to contributions regarding the sense of the text subject to interpretation, not about the merits of the case, already analyzed extensively, debated in detail, and clearly decided. 43. The majority of the Court adopted the decision to do without the hearing and decide on the requests for interpretation as it did so with the ruling to which I am enclosing this opinion. For this it took into account –and so it stated—“the arguments of the parties that refer to aspects of law and their characteristics, whose nature and scopes can be clearly concluded from the claims presented by those requesting the interpretation.” It is obvious that a hearing was not required to reiterate the arguments expressed in writing, encourage disputes regarding contentious matters tended to, or analyze the sense of words well defined pursuant to their ordinary meaning. 44. As stated at the beginning of this text, my opinion is limited to expressing my own points of view and in no way do they question other opinions, and much less the general direction of the decisions of the Court. One and the other deserve the respect with which I have always expressed, publicly and privately, my coincidences and my discrepancies. Anything different would be inappropriate of a judge and would not correspond to the way in which I have invariably expressed my point of view. Sergio García Ramírez Judge Pablo Saavedra Alessandri Secretary