12 xiii. the detainees “were dynamited for the purpose of concealing all traces of the crime committed.” 25. Therefore, the dispute with respect to these facts has ceased. However, the dispute continues with respect to: i) the alleged theft of property and burning of the victims’ homes; ii) the complaints filed after the events and the response of the State authorities thereto; iii) the manner in which the investigations of the facts were conducted, the recovery and identification of the remains and the forensic procedures; iv) the alleged existence of a series of cover-up mechanisms that were clearly deliberate and included, at least, the denial of the detentions, the use of dynamite on several occasions and during the first ten days after the events in the abandoned “Misteriosa” or “Vallarón” mine as a means to destroy the evidence of what happened, as well as the harassment and detention of villagers who reported the facts, and threats to justice operators, and v) the alleged lack of due diligence and irregularities in the capture of the fugitive defendants. 26. In short, the State’s acknowledgement constitutes a partial acceptance of the facts. Nevertheless, considering the seriousness of these events, the Court will proceed to establish those that generated the State’s responsibility, as well as the context in which they took place, since this contributes to the reparation of the victims, to prevent the repetition of similar facts and, in sum, to satisfy the purposes of the inter-American human rights system. 10 27. On the other hand, with regard to the legal arguments raised by the parties, the Court recalls that it has applied the principle of estoppel to grant full scope to the acknowledgements of responsibility made by States, which they then sought to disregard in subsequent stages of the inter-American proceedings, either before the Commission or the Court, including in cases against Peru. 11 In this regard, the Court recalls that according to international practice, when a party to a dispute adopts a certain attitude that is to its own detriment or to the benefit of the other party, by virtue of the principle of estoppel, it cannot then assume another conduct that is contradictory to the first. 12 28. In the instant case, the Court notes that, in a brief of January 17, 2005, submitted to the Inter-American Commission, Peru indicated that “[t]he acts perpetrated in the community of Santa Bárbara constitute a violation of the right to liberty, life and physical integrity enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, the American Convention on Human Rights, the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment and the Inter-American Convention to Prevent and Punish Torture. These international instruments were in force at the time of the commission of the facts.” 13 In these terms, the Inter-American Commission issued its Report on Admissibility and Merits (supra para. 2. b). 10 Cf. Case of Tiu Tojín v. Guatemala. Merits, reparations and costs. Judgment of November 26, 2008. Series C No. 190, para. 26, and Case of Rodríguez Vera et al. (Disappeared of the Palace of Justice) v. Colombia, supra, para. 33. 11 Cf. Case of Neira Alegría et al. v. Peru. Preliminary objections. Judgment of December 11, 1991. Series C No. 13, para. 29, and Case of Cruz Sánchez et al. v. Peru. Preliminary objections, merits, reparations and costs. Judgment of April 17, 2015. Series C No. 292, para. 53. 12 Cf. Case of Neira Alegría et al. v. Peru. Preliminary objections, supra, para. 29, and Case of Cruz Sánchez et al. v. Peru, supra, para. 53. 13 The State indicated, in the section on “Background”, that “this case is related to the forced disappearanceextrajudicial execution of 15 persons […]”; however, neither the section on “Considerations – procedural Synthesis” nor the section of “Conclusions”, where it makes the acknowledgment of responsibility, characterizes the facts of the case as forced disappearance. Cf. Brief of the State of January 17, 2005 (evidence file, folio 970). On the other hand, in a brief of September 23, 1991, the State merely referred to the “alleged detention-disappearance of the citizens” (emphasis added) and transcribed a Preliminary Report of the Public Prosecutor’s Office, prepared by the Assistant Provincial Prosecutor of Huancavelica, which indicated that “it has been determined that the fourteen members of the Santa Bárbara Peasant Community, the subject of investigation by this Special Prosecutor's Office, were detained on July 4 of this year and to date are missing, among them seven minors. It has not been conclusively proven that the remains found in the mine in the Rodeo Pampa sector belong to the disappeared persons.” Brief of September 23, 1991 (evidence file, folios 551 to 553). For the Court, the statements contained in said briefs of January 2005 and September