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Advisory Opinion OC-22/16 . Series A, No. 22. At http://www.corteidh.or.cr. Inter-American Court of Human Rights, February 26, 2016.
International Decisions: Edited by Ingrid Wuerth
On February 26, 2016, the Inter-American Court of Human Rights (Court) issued an advisory opinion requested by the Republic of Panama (Advisory Opinion).1The request stemmed from "doubts among States" as to whether "legal persons, being legal fictions, are not as such entitled to rights" (Request) (para. 2). The Court unanimously held that legal persons are not entitled to rights under the American Convention on Human Rights (Convention) because Article 1.2 of the Convention establishes rights only in favor of natural persons.2The Court, also unanimously, reiterated that indigenous and tribal communities are entitled to rights under the Convention. By majority vote, the Court held that labor union organizations are entitled to rights under the Protocol of San Salvador (Protocol).3The Advisory Opinion is most significant for its finding regarding labor union organizations and for its analysis of how general international law relates to various aspects of the Inter-American system.
The Court began by considering the applicable law, reasoning that
the corpus iuris of international law of human rights is composed of ... rules expressly established in international treaties or contained in customary international law ... as well as general principles of law and ... norms of general character or of soft law, which serve as guidance for the interpretation of the former. (Para. 29)
Furthermore, the Court affirmed that two obligations arise in connection with Article 1.1 of the Convention. Under Article 1.1, states must adopt "measures necessary to make human rights effective ... also with respect to legal persons which find themselves under their jurisdiction." Relatedly, legal persons are
bound to respect, in the respective internal or national order, human rights and ... the relevant states may see their international responsibility engaged to the extent that they do not guarantee their free and full exercise by any natural person subject to their jurisdiction. (Para. 31)
The Court then proceeded to address the questions presented in the Request.
First, the Court examined the entitlement of legal persons to rights in the Inter-American system by applying the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties (Vienna Convention or...