4 12. The European Court of Human Rights has asserted that the right to freedom of peaceful assembly (Article 11 of the European Convention) cannot be reduced to “a mere duty” of the State not to interfere, as it requires that positive steps be taken, “even in the sphere of relations among individuals, if necessary."15 There is, for example, recognition that protection of the right to privacy (Article 8 of the Convention) also comprises relations among individuals,16 against undue interference not only of public authorities but also of individuals, associations, or groups of individuals (erga omnes protection). The jurisprudence constante under the European Convention has favored the thesis that the obligations of the State Party comprise the positive measures that must be taken to prevent and punish any and every act that abridges an article of the Convention, including private acts in the sphere of relations among individuals, to ensure effective protection of the rights set forth.17 13. As regards the scope of the erga omnes obligations to provide protection, in my Concurring Opinion in Advisory Opinion n. 18 of the Inter-American Court on The Legal Status and Rights of Migrants without Documents (17.09.2003), I recalled that said erga omnes obligations, characterized by the jus cogens (from which they derive)18 as having a necessarily objective nature, therefore encompass all those addressed by the legal provisions (omnes), including both the members of bodies of State power and private persons (para. 76). And I added: "[...] In a vertical dimension, the obligations erga omnes of protection bind both the organs and agents of (State) public power, and the individuals themselves (in the inter-individual relations). [...] as to the vertical dimension, the general obligation, set forth in Article 1(1) of the American Convention, to respect and to ensure respect for the free exercise of the rights protected by it, generates effects erga omnes, encompassing the relations of the individual both with the public (State) power as well as with other individuals (particuliers).”19 (paras. 77-78) 14. The State has the inescapable duty of protection erga omnes, including relations among individuals. The Inter-American Court has also asserted that the power of the State to enforce public order “is not unlimited,” as “it has the duty, at all times, to apply procedures that are in accordance with the Law and that respect the fundamental rights of all individuals under its jurisdiction (...)."20 The European Court of Human Rights has expressed a similar line of thought, stating in the Case of 15 . European Court of Human Rights, Çase of the Plattform `Arzte für das Leben' versus Austria, Judgment of 21.06.1988, p. 8, para. 32. 16 . E.g., harassments, clandestine recording of a conversation by a private person with help from the police, custody of a child, among other situations. 17 . G. Cohen-Jonathan, La Convention européenne des droits de l'homme, Aix-en-Provence/Paris, Pr. Univ. d'Aix-Marseille/Economica, 1989, pp. 78-81 and 284-285; and for a general study see A. Clapham, Human Rights in the Private Sphere, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1993 (reprint 1996), pp. 1-356. 18 . In that same Opinion, I stated specifically that “by definition, all the norms of jus cogens generate necessarily obligations erga omnes. While jus cogens is a concept of material law, the obligations erga omnes refer to the structure of their performance on the part of all the entities and all the individuals bound by them. In their turn, not all the obligations erga omnes necessarily refer to norms of jus cogens” (para. 80). 19 See, in this respect, in general, the resolution adopted by the Institut de Droit International (I.D.I.) at the 1989 session of Santiago de Compostela (Article 1), in: I.D.I., 63 Annuaire de l'Institut de Droit International (1989)-II, pp. 286 and 288-289. 20 . IACtHR, Case of Juan Humberto Sánchez v. Honduras, Judgment of 07.06.2003, Series C, n. 99, para. 111.