Atachahua v. Peru
Key Judgment
Legal Relevance
Keywords: Effective Remedy | Admissibility | Obligation to Prevent | Children/Youth
Themes: Characteristics of the Crime | Justice and Truth | Related Crimes
The Committee found that abduction and further disappearance of the victim and prevention of contact with her family and with the outside world amounts to cruel and inhuman treatment. The Committee also found that extra-conventional procedures or mechanisms established by the UN whose missions are to report on human rights situations do not constitute procedures of international investigation or settlement within the meaning of Article 5.2 (a) of the ICCPR Optional Protocol. On this basis, it dismissed Peru's challenge of the Committee's competence to deal with the case because the same question was pending before the UN Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances.
Judgment Date
March 25, 1996
Country
Peru
Judicial Body
Human Rights Committee
Articles violated
Article 6(1) [ICCPR], Article 7 [ICCPR], Article 9(1) [ICCPR], Article 2(1) [ICCPR], Article 24(1) [ICCPR]
Articles not violated / not dealt with
Article 3 [ICCPR], Article 10(1) [ICCPR]
Facts of the Case
Ms. Ana Rosario Celis Laureano was violently removed from her home in the district of Ambar, Province of Huaura, Peru by unknown armed men on 13 August 1992 when she was 16 years old. She remained unaccounted for since then. The evidence provided by her family about the type of clothes and arms of the kidnappers, and the way in which the abduction was carried out indicates that military or special police units in Huaura or Huacho may have been responsible for her disappearance. The victim had previously been arrested and detained by the military. Ms. Laureano and her family had previously received life threats by a captain of the military base at Ambar.