By Claudia Peiró |At the Inauguration of the Inter-American Judicial Year, the president of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights (IACHR), Costa Rican Judge Nancy Hernández López, denied in her speech that this court is financed “by private interests to favor a certain agenda”. She alluded to “unsubstantiated” claims that are circulating. “On this point I want to be absolutely emphatic, this is absolutely false. The Inter-American Court does not receive contributions that are aimed at favoring particular issues or countries,” in the speech delivered last January 29.
Although without mentioning it, Hernández López was alluding to the document “Balance of the financing of the IACHR [Inter-American Commission on Human Rights] and the Inter-American Court 2009-2021. Opacities and Influences in Conditional Funding,” published by the Global Center for Human Rights, a Washington-based human rights NGO.
In a statement entitled “The Inter-American Court lies: it does receive conditional funding”, the president of the Global Center, lawyer Sebastián Schuff, explains that the report “documents that, for at least two years, the Spanish Agency for International Development Cooperation (AECID) financed projects of the Court whose titles defined specific issues, promoting a specific political agenda”.
Incidentally, the Global Center for Human Rights (GCHR) demands transparency from the IACHR Court in its financing.
“We understand that the judge is referring to our report published in 2022. But if she is not, it would be important for her to read it,” says Schuff. He explains, “There we documented that AECID, the Spanish Agency for International Development Cooperation, funded on at least two occasions, 2016 and 2018, Court projects whose titles defined specific thematic issues, driving a specific political agenda.”
The study conducted by the GCHR, which covered a period of 13 years and was based on the reports of the system itself, showed how interest groups, companies, large foundations and even governments of countries that are not members of the Organization of American States (OAS), develop a lobbying action through contributions to the financing of the Inter-American Human Rights System (IAHRS), formed by the Inter-American Commission (IACHR) and the Court (I/A Court H.R.). The Commission, it should be noted, is the one that decides which cases are brought before the Court.
The document shows that there is a correlation between many reports of the Commission and, even more serious, judgments of the Court, with funds received for a predetermined destination, i.e., with a specific purpose in the subject matter of the donor’s interest.
Both the Court and the Commission have an official budget that comes from the contributions of the members of the OAS. But for several years now, another modality has been available: “extraordinary” contributions from foundations, NGOs, governments and companies. Often these contributions have a title, i.e., they specify the subject matter that the Commission or the Court is expected to address. This can define a bias in bodies that should be impartial.
The Inter-American Human Rights System, the quasi-judicial system of the OAS, consists of the Commission and the Court; hence its importance and the power of the Organization of American States. The Commission cannot impose criteria on countries. Article 41 of the American Convention defines that its functions are consultative: to stimulate human rights in the region, to make reports, to consult the countries on the human rights situation, but it does not have the competence to impose any type of guidelines on the countries. But the commission is the one that receives the cases, makes a first analysis, and defines their admissibility. It then publishes a report and makes recommendations to the State in the specific case. After a certain period of time, if the State does not comply with these recommendations, the Commission may decide to send the case to the Court. No case goes directly to the Court; it always goes through the Commission.
In its press release, the GCHR notes that the Court produces an average of eleven judgments and less than one advisory opinion per year. But, according to the report prepared by the NGO, in 2016 the Court produced, on the topics indicated in the title of the project funded by AECID, that is, by the Spanish government, two judgments. With another project, in six months, between 2017 and 2018, it produced three advisory opinions, which shows that the attention to these issues is, at least, strikingly disproportionate compared to its ordinary work.
