The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (the IACHR or, in the three other official languages – Spanish, French, and Portuguese – CIDH, Comisión Interamericana de los Derechos Humanos, Commission Interaméricaine des Droits de l'Homme, Comissão Interamericana de Direitos Humanos) is an autonomous organ of the Organization of American States (OAS). The separate Inter-American Court of Human Rights is an autonomous judicial institution based in the city of San José, Costa Rica. Together the Court and the Commission make up the human rights protection system of the OAS.

Composition

The IACHR is a permanent body, with headquarters in Washington, D.C., United States, and it meets in regular and special sessions several times a year to examine allegations of human rights violations in the hemisphere. Its human rights duties stem from three documents:

History of the Inter-American human rights system

The inter-American system for the protection of human rights emerged with the adoption of the American Declaration of the Rights and Duties of Man by the OAS in April 1948 – the first international human rights instrument of a general nature, predating the Universal Declaration of Human Rights by more than six months. The IACHR was created in 1959. It held its first meeting in 1960, and it conducted its first on-site visit to inspect the human rights situation in the Dominican Republic in 1961. A major step in the development of the system was taken in 1965 when the commission was expressly authorized to examine specific cases of human rights violations. Since that date the IACHR has received thousands of petitions and has processed in excess of 12,000 individual cases. In 1969, the guiding principles behind the American Declaration were taken, reshaped, and restated in the American Convention on Human Rights. The Convention defines the human rights that the states parties are required to respect and guarantee, and it also ordered the establishment of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights. It is currently binding on 24 of the OAS's 35 member states. The commission's performance has not been always welcomed. Among others, Venezuela has accused the Commission of politicization. Others criticize the commission's stress on certain issues over others. These criticisms have given rise to what was called the "Strengthening Process of the Commission". This process began in 2011, led by the States belonging to the Bolivarian Alliance for the Americas.

Functions

The main task of the IACHR is to promote the observance and defense of human rights in the Americas. In pursuit of this mandate it:

Rapporteurships and units

The IACHR has created several thematic rapporteurships and two special rapporteurships to monitor OAS states' compliance with inter-American human rights treaties in the following areas: The Special Rapporteur for Freedom of Expression and the Special Rapporteur for Economic, Social, Cultural, and Environmental Rights are full-time dedicated positions. The former was created in 1997, while the latter was established in 2017, with Soledad García Muñoz of Argentina as the first holder of the office. The other rapporteurships are in the hands of the commissioners, who have other functions at the IACHR and also their own jobs in their home countries, since their work as commissioners is unpaid. Rapporteurships are initially established by the commission as thematic units prior to being upgraded to rapporteurships. The IACHR also has a Press and Outreach Office.

Petitions

The Commission processes petitions lodged with it pursuant to its Rules of Procedure. Petitions may be filed by NGOs or individuals. Unlike most court filings, petitions are confidential documents and are not made public. Petitions must meet three requirements; domestic remedies must have already been tried and failed (exhaustion), petitions must be filed within six months of the last action taken in a domestic system (timeliness), petitions can not be before another court (duplication of procedure). Once a petition has been filed, it follows the following procedure:

Composition

The IACHR's ranking officers are its seven commissioners. The commissioners are elected by the OAS General Assembly, for four-year terms, with the possibility of re-election on one occasion, for a maximum period in office of eight years. They serve in a personal capacity and are not considered to represent their countries of origin but rather "all the member countries of the Organization" (Art. 35 of the convention). The convention (Art. 34) says that they must "be persons of high moral character and recognized competence in the field of human rights". No two nationals of the same member state may be commissioners simultaneously (Art. 37), and commissioners are required to refrain from participating in the discussion of cases involving their home countries.

Current commissioners (2024)

Source of IACHR Composition.

Past commissioners

Executive Secretaries

The staff of the IACHR comprise its Secretariat, which is led by an Executive Secretary, who serves for what have recently been four-year, renewable contracts. In August 2020, OAS Secretary General Luis Almagro announced that he would not renew Paulo Abrão's contract as Executive Secretary of the IACHR, citing 61 personnel complaints by staff of the organization. The Commissioners of the IACHR had unanimously approved the contract extension in January 2020, and expressed their "profound rejection" of Almagro's action "whose refusal to renew this contract breaks with a 20-year practice of respecting the IACHR's decision to appoint its own Executive Secretary and thus makes it difficult to obtain truth, justice, and reparation for those whose labor rights have been affected." UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet, Human Rights Watch, and the Mexican government have also objected to Abrão's removal. Tania Reneaum, a Mexican, was appointed as the new Executive Secretary in 2021.

Human rights violations investigated by the Inter-American Commission