manner throughout the justice process, taking into account their personal situation, needs, age, gender, disability and level of maturity and fully respecting their physical, mental and moral integrity.”155 90. Finally, the United Nations Guidelines on Justice in Matters involving Child Victims and Witnesses of Crime also sets out a series of principles that States must uphold. 156 Those guidelines stipulate that all information related to the participation of a child in a judicial proceeding, including cases in which the child is a victim of sexual abuse, should be protected.157 That can be achieved through maintaining confidentiality and restricting disclosure of information that may lead to identification of a child who is a victim or witness in a justice process.158 In relation to the testimony of children, the Guidelines indicate that the “testimony should not be presumed invalid or untrustworthy by reason of the child’s age alone as long as his or her age and maturity allow the giving of intelligible and credible testimony, with or without communication aids and other assistance”.159 91. In addition, the State should take measures to protect child victims and witnesses from hardship during the detection, investigation, and prosecution process in order to ensure that their best interests and dignity are respected. 160 Such measures include the following: i) ensuring that child victims are questioned in a child-sensitive manner; ii) limiting the number of interviews; and iii) using child-sensitive procedures, including interview rooms designed for children, interdisciplinary services, modified courtroom environments, recesses during a child’s testimony, hearings scheduled at appropriate times of day, and other measures to facilitate the child’s testimony.161 1.3. Legal analysis of what happened to V.R.P 92. Preliminarily, the Commission notes that the duty to guarantee to properly investigate an alleged rape by a nonstate actor is borned from the criminal complaint. Consequently, in order to activate such obligation it is not necessary to prove in an internationally procedure the existence of the rape. 93. The Commission would like to emphasize that international protection of human rights should not be confused with criminal justice. 162 In this sense, the evidentiary standards or requirements are not those of a criminal court, given that the Commission does not have the competence to determine individual criminal responsibility, nor to evaluate, under such criteria, said evidence. In the same sense, the European Court maintained that it was not concerned with reaching any findings as to guilt or innocence under domestic law.163 94. With respect to the evaluation of evidence, the Inter-American Court has stated that rape is a specific form of violence which, in general, occurs in the absence of persons other than the victim and the 155 UN, Committee on the Rights of the Child, General Comment No. 13, The right of the child to freedom from all forms of violence, April 18, 2011, para. 54. 156 UN, Guidelines on Justice in Matters involving Child Victims and Witnesses of Crime, E/2005/INF/2/Add.1. Available at: http://www.un.org/es/events/childrenday/pdf/E2005_20.pdf. 157 UN, Guidelines on Justice in Matters involving Child Victims and Witnesses of Crime, Guideline 27. UN, Guidelines on Justice in Matters involving Child Victims and Witnesses of Crime, Guideline 27. UN, Guidelines on Justice in Matters involving Child Victims and Witnesses of Crime, Guideline 18. In addition, international criminal courts have established the possibitlity of children to render his/her testimony. See: Statute of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia. Article 90 (B); and Statute of the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda. Article 90 (C). 158 159 160 UN, Guidelines on Justice in Matters involving Child Victims and Witnesses of Crime, Guideline 29. 161 UN, Guidelines on Justice in Matters involving Child Victims and Witnesses of Crime, Guideline 29. 162 Inter-American Court. Case of Rosendo Cantú and other v. Mexico. Preliminary Objections, Merits, Reparations, and Costs. Judgment of August 31, 2010. Series C No. 216, par. 105; and Case of Escher et al. v. Brazil. Preliminary Objections, Merits, Reparations, and Costs. Judgment of July 6, 2009. Series C No. 200, par. 134. 163 ECHR, E. et al. v. United Kingdom. Judgment of November 26, 2002, par. 91.

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