executive, or judicial branches of the State, which is accountable as a whole and
assumes international responsibility for any breaches of international instruments it
has signed. As stated by García Ramírez:
27.
For the purposes of the American Convention and the exercise of the
contentious jurisdiction of the Inter-American Court, the State is considered
integrally, as a whole. Accordingly, responsibility is global, it involves the State as a
whole and cannot be subject to the division of authority established in domestic law.
At the international level, it is not possible to divide the State, to bring before the
Court only one or some of its organs, to grant them representation of the State in
the proceeding – without this representation affecting the whole State – and
excluding other organs from this conventional system of responsibility, leaving their
actions outside the “conventionality control” which is implied by the jurisdiction of
the international court. 79 (Underlining added).
61.
Thus, the judges of the States Parties to the Convention are also required to
comply with the provisions of the Convention and the doctrine of “diffuse
conventionality control” facilitates their task of interpreting national provisions
(including the constitutional text) to ensure these conform to the Inter-American
corpus juris and not applying those that are in absolute contravention of the
aforementioned “block of conventionality”. In this way, they prevent the State from
being internationally responsible for violating international human rights
commitments.
62.
“Diffuse conventionality control" is also based on Article 29 of the Pact of
San Jose, inasmuch as all the powers and organs of the States that have signed
this international instrument, including judges and bodies that administer justice
and perform judicial functions, are required, through their interpretations, to allow
the broadest possible enjoyment and exercise of the rights and freedoms
recognized in the Convention and its additional protocols (and in other international
instruments under the aforementioned terms). 80 This, in turn, implies making
restrictive interpretations whenever these treaties are being limited, always based
on the jurisprudence of the Inter-American Court.
63.
From Article 68(1) it is clear that States Parties to the Pact of San Jose “are
committed to compliance with the Court’s decisions in all cases to which they are
parties.” This cannot limit the task of ensuring that the Inter-American Court’s
jurisprudence has “direct effectiveness” in all national States that have expressly
recognized its jurisdiction, regardless of whether it concerns a matter in which they
have not participated formally as a "material party.” Given that the Inter-American
Court is the international judicial body of the Inter-American System for the
Protection of Human Rights, whose essential function is to apply and interpret the
Convention, its interpretations acquire the same degree of effectiveness as the text
of the Convention. In other words, the conventional provisions which States must
apply are the result of interpretations of the provisions of the Pact of San Jose (and
its additional protocols, as well as other international instruments). The
interpretations issued by the Inter-American Court have two purposes: (i) to
ensure the Convention’s effectiveness in the particular case with subjective effects,
and (ii) to establish general effectiveness with the effects of interpreted standards.
Hence, the logic and necessity that the ruling - aside from being notified to the
State party in the specific dispute - also be ”transmitted to the State Parties to the
79
note 11.
80
Cf. para. 27 of his Concurring Opinion in the Case of Myrna Mack Chang v. Guatemala, supra
Cf. supra para. 44 to 52 in his Concurring Opinion.
22
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