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VII.
MERITS
90.
In attention to the violations of the rights enshrined in the Convention alleged in this
case, the Court will carry out the following analysis: 1) The right to collective property; 2)
The duty to adopt domestic legal regulations; 3) The right to life of Oscar Brega, Jesús Álvarez
Roche, Jorge Castillo Jiménez, and Julio Alberto Morales, and 4) the Right to a fair process
and judicial protection.
VII-1.
RIGHT TO COLLECTIVE PROPERTY
(Article 21 of the Convention in relation to Articles 1(1) and 2)
A. Arguments of the parties of and of the Commission
91.
The Commission observed that state authorities have participated in actions and
omissions that have prevented the acknowledgment of the Community’s right to their
traditional property, as well as the effective use and enjoyment of their lands and natural
resources. The Commission indicated that the territory occupied by the Community has been
possessed by them traditionally and it has maintained its own ways of social and cultural
organization, its traditions, lifestyle, and relationship with the land. It also indicated that it
had been proven that the Community started the process to achieve acknowledgment of rights
over the lands it has historically occupied since 1946 and that it obtained a communal title
deed for part of its traditional lands in 1950 and a title deed of guarantee of occupation over
another area in 1979, which did not acknowledge per se their right to property, but rights
limited to the use and enjoyment of the lands. It indicated that it was not until 1993 and 2001
that the State granted the Community title deeds of full ownership over 615 hectares and
28.71 square meters, while the territory reclaimed by the Community accounts for an
approximate surface of de 2,840 hectares. Additionally, the Commission stated that the part
of the territory that was not acknowledged by the State coincides, in general, with the area
used by the Community for its traditional subsistence activities, such as hunting, fishing, and
agriculture.
92.
Moreover, the Commission referred to the alleged non-compliance by the State with
duties related to the Community’s territorial rights, such as: lack of timely determination and
delimitation of the titled lands, lack of judicial certainty in the title deeds granted, restrictions
in access to parts of the traditional territory due to the creation of protected areas124 and the
omission to effectively protect its territory against the occupation and stripping by third
parties, and guarantee that it be exclusively indigenous. Additionally, the Commission
observed that pursuant to the legislation in force at the time of the expansion of the urban
area of Tela, at least 126.40 hectares of the area given to the Community as beneficiary of
the Agrarian Reform should be excluded from the expansion, or in its defect full payment
should have been made as per the value of the land. Likewise, the Commission indicated that
the Community’s right to property over the lands titled in their favor was infringed when state
It considered that one of the hindrances for full enjoyment of the traditional territory is related to the
creation of a protected area in Punta Izopo, and the handing over of its administration to the private foundation
PROLANSATE. In that sense, it reiterated that the adoption of measures addressed to the titling for third parties
within the Punta Izopo Natural Protected Area is contrary to the Community’s territorial rights given that part of the
Community’s traditional lands is within this area’s buffer zone. It also stated that the creation of the park entails a
restriction to the rights to use and enjoy the area by part of the Community’s members and that the Community was
prevented from carrying out its activities of cultural and economic subsistence at Punta Izopo, and additionally,
several of its areas have been destined to purposes different to environmental conservation.
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