OEA/Ser.L/V/II.76 ANNUAL
REPORT OF THE INTER-AMERICAN COMMISSION INTRODUCTION
The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) has the honor to
submit its report to the General Assembly, in compliance with the provisions of
Article 52 f of the Charter of the Organization of American States.
This report contains six chapters and has been prepared in accordance
with Resolution 331 (VIII-0/80) of the General Assembly and Article 63 of the
new Regulations of the Commission.
Chapter I is a brief summary of the Commission's origin and juridical
bases. This chapter also contains a brief account of the Commission's
relationship with other organs of the inter-American system and regional and
global institutions of a similar nature during 1988 and 1989.
Chapter II refers to the activities undertaken by the Commission during
the period covered by this report. Emphasis is placed on the Commission's
principal activities, as well as the subjects it dealt with and the most
important measures taken during its various sessions. It includes the
participation of the Commission in the eighteenth regular session of the General
Assembly as well as the resolutions adopted by this organ in relation to the
work of the Commission in the field of human rights.
Chapter III is entitled “Resolutions on Individual Cases.” This
chapter contains several resolutions adopted by the Commission regarding
specific cases presented to it, which the Commission processed in accordance
with the applicable legal provisions.
In Chapter IV the Commission has included special reports on developments
in the human rights situation in Cuba, Chile, El Salvador, Guatemala, Haiti,
Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay and Suriname, all of which have been the subject of
previous Commission reports, in order to examine developments in the observance
of human rights in these countries during the period encompassed by this report.
In Chapter V, the Commission, in view of the important mandate it
received and due to the lack of adequate information presented until now,
considers it opportune to describe the actions that it was involved in in
Nicaragua regarding the situation of the former members of the National Guard
who had been sentenced by Special Tribunals, actions which culminated in the
release of a large number of these prisoners. Chapter VI constitutes a study by the Commission on areas in which the States should institute measures to further the cause of human rights, in accordance with the American Declaration of the Rights and Duties of Man and the American Convention on Human Rights. At this time the Commission in this chapter shall refer to the current state of codification and progressive development of the international law of human rights and to the measures which, in its judgment, should be adopted to accelerate this process; the important subject of political rights and representative democracy; and to an initiative to promote an instrument for the purpose of defining the rights of indigenous peoples on the occasion of the 500th anniversary in 1992 of the encounter of two worlds. [ Table of Contents | Next ] |