The joint responsibility of the international community to impunity
Crimes against humanity result from non-compliance with international humanitarian law and human rights obligations. The perpetration of these crimes affects the coexistence of the international community, which is based on principles and values and sustained by norms that should govern the conduct of nations. The systemic and widespread violation of human rights impacts society and cannot be seen as the problem of a single nation.
The principle of the legal solidarity of States is based on the fact that they are part of a community and what happens in one directly or indirectly affects the rest of its members, obliging them to act in defense of international law. They ensure its primacy, on the understanding that all are jointly responsible for its full validity and that when one fails the others must be ready to intervene. Hence the principle of supplementary jurisdiction in matters of justice against war crimes and crimes against humanity.
The supplementary principle commits all nations and international courts to proceed judicially when it is evident that a State is unwilling to investigate, prosecute, and punish the perpetrators of these crimes, or when the State itself is responsible for non-compliance with the treaties that legally bind it in the field of human rights.
The fight against impunity and the rights of victims to receive reparations for the violations to which they have been subjected are areas that are developing within the framework of public international law, originating in the recognition of the suffering of those affected and the need to confront acts that outrage the conscience of humanity.
The United Nations has contributed to the codification of international obligations regarding the duties of States in the administration of justice, giving rise to international principles in the fight against impunity and the right of victims to obtain reparation.
With the honorable exception of the investigation process opened in Argentina and the cases brought before the Inter-American Court of Human Rights, the above principles and their derived obligations still do not prevail for thousands of Nicaraguan victims.
Impunity reigns in the Ortega Murillo regime, where they pretend to amnesty crimes that shouldn’t be, reward criminals with promotions and bonuses, and prevent those affected from knowing the truth and from exercising accessible and effective remedies for justice, because the highest State officials, Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo, are the most responsible for the perpetration of these crimes. They organize and direct a criminal structure that implements increasingly effective repressive methods and pursues without any limit dissenting voice.
Faced with rampant impunity, Nicaraguans without the possibility of access to independent courts, placed their hopes in the various avenues of international justice, guided by the recommendations of the United Nations Group of Human Rights Experts on Nicaragua (GHREN), the Interdisciplinary Group of Independent Experts (GIEI) and the Special Follow-up Mechanism for Nicaragua (MESENI) of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR), and the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights.
The Nicaraguan Democratic Concertation (CDN) shares the aspiration that the international community honor its obligations in terms of international justice, attending to the recommendations of human rights organizations, promoting the implementation of some of the following actions:
- Internationalized tribunals through the application of the principle of universal justice in the domestic legislation of States (Argentina case).
- The International Criminal Court by resolution of the United Nations Security Council or by action of the prosecutor, in cases of crimes committed in the territory of States parties to the Rome Statute.
- The International Court of Justice, through strategic litigation in the public interest for non-compliance with obligations as a State party to the Convention Against Torture, the Statute of Stateless Persons, and the Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness.
- The Inter-American Court of Human Rights, promoting the expansion of cases and providing it with sufficient resources and means.