6 the Commission agrees to notify the petitioners that a report has been approved, pursuant to Article 50 of the American Convention on Human Rights. 15. On March 17, 1999, Bolivia replied to the Commission’s Report indicating that the State’s decision to unilaterally initiate an investigation to clarify the facts had been ignored in the sections “Analysis” and “Recommendations” of the Report, which are the most relevant, and is only mentioned in the section “Summary.” Furthermore, Bolivia indicated that it had already complied with the recommendations to prepare a draft law that classifies forced disappearance as a crime and to ratify the Inter-American Convention on Forced Disappearance of Persons. Lastly, it requested that the Commission incorporate the aforementioned information in the Report objectively, so that it could be taken into consideration when the case was being examined. 16. On May 7, 1999, Bolivia expanded its previous brief, requesting that the Commission reconsider Report No. 26/99, since it allegedly omitted information and was based on arguments that had been rectified by Bolivia “with the offer of acquiescence to the terms of the arrangements suggested by the petitioner (the victim’s mother), with the sole condition of confidentiality during the course of the proceeding.” Moreover, the State manifested its surprise regarding the Commission’s recommendations, as many of them had already been complied with. 17. With regard to the investigation of the facts, Bolivia indicated that, in order to continue this, the victim’s mother should ratify the complaint before the domestic authorities. It said that the Commission had not referred to the 21 years that had elapsed between the fact and the complaint presented to the Commission. It added that no complaint had been presented before the judicial authorities throughout the democratic period enjoyed by Bolivia since 1982, and this attitude shows that the petitioner “is hiding some political motive.” Moreover, Bolivia stated that, in 1979, the victim’s mother denounced that her son had been shot to death, as can be seen in the Congress of the Republic’s file corresponding to the action on responsibilities against the national government of that time, which showed that the petitioner had filed the same case twice, with different characterizations (before the Congress of the Republic and before the Commission). 18. With regard to the State’s reply, in summary, the Commission advised that: a) it had not only evaluated and examined the information provided by Bolivia, but had also recorded it when processing and analyzing the case in the Report; b) the effort made by the State to investigate the facts and punish those responsible was insufficient, since in January 1999, Mary Severich, District Public Defense Coordinator of the Ministry of Justice in Santa Cruz, requested the Prosecutor to order the Judicial Police to commence steps to establish responsibility and punish the guilty parties but since January and until the day the application was presented to the Court, Bolivia did not provide evidence that would demonstrate any jurisdictional activity tending to punish those responsible; c) the State did not comply with the Commission’s recommendation to prepare a draft law classifying forced disappearance of persons as a crime and incorporate it into the Criminal Code; it even contradicted itself, because