Under article 5 of the American Convention, every person ‘has the right to have his physical, mental, and moral integrity respected’, and no one, particularly women,³⁴ must be subjected to torture or to ill-treatment. Under article 1, States Parties undertake to respect the rights and freedoms recognised in the Convention, and to ensure them to all persons under their jurisdiction.

Read together, articles 1 and 5 provide that States must ensure that no one subject to their jurisdiction suffers torture or ill-treatment. This obligation is not purely negative in nature: while States must avoid interfering with the rights and freedoms enshrined in the American Convention, they must also take steps to prevent such interference.³⁵

Firstly, States must criminalise sexual violence and ensure that its definition includes lack of consent as its central element. Consent can only be established through acts that clearly express the will of the person prior to the act in a free, reversible manner, such as verbal consent or behaviour that clearly shows voluntary participation.³⁶ Criteria that determine lack of consent include:

• Use of force or threat to use it;
• Coercion or fear of violence or reprisals;
• Intimidation;
• Detention and/or deprivation of liberty;
• Psychological oppression;
• Abuse of power;
• Inability to understand sexual violence.³⁷

States must legislate that consent cannot be inferred:

• When force, threat of force, coercion or a coercive environment has undermined the victim/survivor’s ability to give free and voluntary consent;
• When the victim/survivor is unable to give free consent;
• When the victim/survivor is silent and/or does not resist sexual violence; and
• When, in a coercive environment, there is a power dynamic that forces the victim/survivor to participate in the act for fear of reprisal.³⁸

At the domestic level, States must fulfil their public functions in line with human rights.³⁹ The judiciary, in particular, must not apply or interpret human rights treaties in a manner that is contrary to their object and purpose.⁴⁰

Under article 7(a) of the Convention of Belém do Pará, States must refrain from committing violence against women, and ensure that their authorities, officials, personnel, agents, and institutions act in conformity with this obligation.⁴¹

CRSV committed in the use of force. Law enforcement personnel may never resort to sexual violence in the use of force.⁴² In Women of Atenco, a case in which police agents used excessive force and sexual violence against eleven women, the Court found that the State had failed to comply with its obligations:

1. To adequately regulate the use of force in domestic legislation;
2. To train and educate its law enforcement personnel in the standards and principles for the protection of human rights in the use of force;
3. To establish mechanisms to control the legitimacy of the use of force; and
4. To respect and ensure the rights of the victims/survivors against the use of excessive and illegitimate force.⁴³

As a rule, States must prevent human rights violations, ‘including those committed by private third parties’. The obligation to prevent is one of means, and it is not necessarily breached when a right has been violated.⁴⁴ In addition, under the Convention of Belém do Pará, States must prevent, punish and eradicate violence against women, whether committed in the public or the private sphere.⁴⁵

To establish State responsibility for the actions of third parties, the Court has held that a ‘general context of collaboration and acquiescence is not enough’. Rather, the State’s acquiescence or collaboration must be ‘specific to the circumstances’. In this regard, the Court looks at whether a violation was committed ‘with the support or tolerance’ of the State, or whether the State allowed the violation to be committed without preventing it or punishing the private perpetrator.

Under the IACPPT, the following individuals may be liable for CRSV amounting to torture:

• A public servant or employee who, acting in that capacity, orders, instigates or induces torture, or directly commits it or, ‘being able to prevent it, fails to do so’; or
• A person who, at the instigation of that public servant or that employee, orders, instigates or induces torture, directly commits it or is an accomplice to it.⁴⁶

Finally, in conflict situations, the Court has found that sexual violence should not be examined as an isolated matter, but as part of the broader conflict situation. When a State abuses states of emergency, and sexual violence is committed against women in an environment in which they are already at risk of discrimination, that State is responsible for its failure to prevent and respond to CRSV committed by State officials, individuals acting with their authorisation and/or acquiescence, and illegal armed groups.⁴⁷

Under article 1 of the American Convention, States must guarantee the Convention’s rights and freedoms to all persons under their jurisdiction ‘without any discrimination for reasons of race, color, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, economic status, birth, or any other social condition’, including ‘sexual orientation and real or perceived gender identity or expression’.⁴⁸

In the implementation of their obligations, States must be particularly mindful of persons experiencing discrimination compounded by multiple factors. For example, an Indigenous woman victim of rape who was unable to access protection because of her lack of knowledge of the official language.⁴⁹

When individuals belong ‘to a particularly vulnerable group’, States’ obligations are increased:⁵⁰ States must not only refrain from violating their rights, but they must also adopt positive measures, based on the person’s specific needs for protection.⁵¹

In Angulo Losada v Bolivia, which concerned a 16-year-old girl subjected to sexual violence by her 26-year-old cousin, the Court stated that situations of vulnerability must be considered in light of the intersectionality between different factors, such as gender and childhood. The fact that the complainant was female and had been a girl at the time of the violence placed her in a situation of double vulnerability, because:

• The perpetrator was a figure of authority to her. Due to this inequality in power, consent could not be inferred;
• In the domestic judicial proceedings, the complainant was forced to recount the sexual violence several times, without regard to the trauma this would cause.⁵²

Women. Under article 9 of the Convention of Belém do Pará, States must ‘take special account of women’s vulnerability to violence’ by reason of, for example, their race or ethnic background or their status as migrants, refugees or displaced persons. States must give similar consideration to ‘women subjected to violence while pregnant or who are disabled, of minor age, elderly, socio-economically disadvantaged, affected by armed conflict or deprived of their freedom’.

Under article 22 of the American Convention, everyone ‘has the right to seek and be granted asylum in a foreign territory’ if they are being pursued ‘for political offenses or related common crimes’. In no case may States deport or return non-citizens and non-nationals⁵³ to a country where their right to life or personal freedom may be violated because of their race, nationality, religion, social status, or political opinions.

The Court has affirmed that, under article 5 of the American Convention,⁵⁴ States must not return or expel any person to a State where their life or liberty may be threatened as a result of persecution ‘for specific reasons or due to generalized violence, foreign aggression, internal conflicts, massive violations of human rights or other circumstances which have seriously disturbed public order’.⁵⁵

In addition, States must not return or expel any person to a third State where they may later be returned to the State where they suffered this risk.⁵⁶

Under article 5 of the American Convention, States must treat all persons deprived of their liberty with respect for their human dignity.⁵⁷

The State, which is responsible for detention establishments, must respect inmates’ fundamental rights and protect their dignity.⁵⁸ When a person suffers injuries under the custody of State agents, the State must provide a satisfactory explanation of what happened.⁵⁹

In Miguel Castro-Castro Prison, the Court examined acts of sexual violence carried out by State police officers against women who were defenceless and ‘subject to the complete control and power of State agents’.⁶⁰ The Court found that this violence directly endangered those women’s dignity and breached their right to humane treatment.⁶¹ The Court noted that the rape of a detainee by a State agent is an especially gross and reprehensible act due to the victim’s vulnerability and the agent’s abuse of power.⁶²

The Court has welcomed measures that some States have adopted to end sexual violence, such as:

• Workshops and courses on violence in the education system;
• Protocols to address the prevention of sexual violence; and
• Education and awareness campaigns to disseminate information on sexual and reproductive health, and gender-based and sexual violence, to the entire population.⁶³

In accordance with their level of maturity, States must incorporate adequate, timely information in compulsory school education materials to provide students with the necessary tools to prevent, identify and report risks and instances of sexual violence, including information on the importance of consent in sexual relationships.⁶⁴

Under article 8 of the Convention of Belém do Pará, States must also establish education programs to:

• Modify social and cultural gender patterns, and to counteract prejudices, customs and all other practices which are based on the inequality of the sexes or on the stereotyped roles for men and women ‘which legitimize or exacerbate violence against women’;
• Encourage media to develop guidelines to help eradicate violence against women in all its forms, and enhance respect for women’s dignity.

Training for State officials. For law enforcement officials, States must develop training standards concerning the necessity of a gender-perspective in criminal proceedings and the elimination of gender stereotypes.⁶⁵ Trainings should be aimed at deconstructing gender stereotypes and false beliefs about sexual violence.⁶⁶ Further, States must train law enforcement officials and members of the armed forces in human rights and international humanitarian law.⁶⁷

Where appropriate, States must establish an independent observatory to monitor training for police officers⁶⁸ aimed at:

1. Educating police forces on including a gender perspective on the discriminatory nature of gender stereotypes during police operations, and on the duty to respect and protect the civilian population they come into contact with; and
2. Training police agents in the standards for the use of force. States must incorporate this training plan into the regular training of members of the State and police forces.⁶⁹ Under article 7 of the IACPPT, States must place special emphasis on the prohibition of the use of torture during interrogation, detention, or arrest in the training of police officers and other public officials responsible for the custody of persons deprived of their liberty.

Under articles 1(1) and 5 of the American Convention, States must investigate possible acts of torture or ill-treatment to ensure everyone’s right to humane treatment.⁷⁰

When there is a well-founded reason to believe that torture or ill-treatment has been committed, States must open and conduct an investigation. States cannot use other legal decisions or proceedings, such as the fact that a rape may have been subject to private right of action, to justify not opening an investigation.⁷¹

In the course of a criminal investigation into sexual violence, States must:

1. Document and coordinate the investigative procedures, avoid omissions in the collection of evidence, and process the evidence diligently;
2. Provide the victim/survivor with information on any progress in the investigation and criminal proceedings and, as appropriate, ensure their adequate participation at all stages of the investigation and trial;
3. Provide the victim/survivor with free legal assistance during all stages of the proceedings;
4. Provide both emergency and, if necessary, ‘continuing medical, prophylactic and psychological care to the victim’;⁷²
5. Provide the victim/survivor,⁷³ as well as, when appropriate, other persons involved such as witnesses, experts, or members of the victim/survivor’s family, with guarantees for their safety;⁷⁴
6. Provide the different organs of the justice system involved with all the human and material resources needed to ‘perform their tasks adequately, independently and impartially’.⁷⁵

Investigations must be ‘serious, impartial and effective’,⁷⁶ whether the perpetrator is a State or private actor.

Investigations must be aimed ‘at determining the truth and the pursuit, capture, prosecution and eventual punishment of the perpetrators’.⁷⁷ A failure to investigate torture and sexual violence in armed conflicts and/or systematic patterns ‘constitutes a breach of the State’s obligations in relation to grave human rights violations’.⁷⁸

Under articles 1(1), 8 and 25 of the American Convention, States must ensure that victims/survivors or their next of kin know the truth about the human rights violations they have suffered,⁷⁹ including through the public disclosure of the results of the criminal and investigation processes.⁸⁰

To this end, States must collect data and figures relating to cases of sexual violence to develop more effective prevention policies,⁸¹ ‘disaggregating the data by communities, ethnic origin, religion or beliefs, health, age, class, migratory status and economic situation’. States must indicate the number of cases prosecuted and the number of indictments, convictions and acquittals.⁸²

IACPPT. Under articles 1, 6 and 8 of the IACPPT, States must take effective measures to prevent and punish torture and ill-treatment within their jurisdiction with commensurate penalties.

Under article 8, States must impartially examine cases involving persons claiming they are a victim of torture. If there is a claim or well-grounded reason to believe that torture has been committed within their jurisdiction, States must properly and immediately conduct an investigation into the case, and initiate, whenever appropriate, the corresponding criminal proceedings.⁸³

Under article 12, a State should prosecute torture and ill-treatment:

1. When committed within their jurisdiction;
2. When the alleged criminal is a national of that State; or
3. When the victim/survivor is a national of that State.

States must also take measures to prosecute torture and ill-treatment when the alleged perpetrator is in an area under their jurisdiction, and it is not appropriate to extradite them.

Convention of Belém do Pará. Under article 7(b) of the Convention of Belém do Pará, States must investigate and punish violence against women with due diligence.⁸⁴ States should conduct investigations determinedly and effectively, due to the duty of society to reject violence against women, and the State’s obligation to eradicate it and to inspire confidence in the victims/survivors in the institutions created to protect them.⁸⁵

States must not impose biased, differentiated conditions to initiate investigations for sexual violence.⁸⁶ For example, States cannot wait until a victim/survivor files a complaint to initiate an investigation into sexual violence.⁸⁷

Sexual violence on a wide scale. When investigating wide scale sexual violence, States should consider the systematic pattern of grave and massive human rights violations that existed at the time the violence occurred,⁸⁸ and investigate such violence with a gender perspective.⁸⁹

Under articles 1(1), 8(1) and 25(1) of the American Convention, States must provide everyone, including ‘presumed victims or their family members’,⁹⁰ with the right to a hearing ‘by a competent, independent, and impartial tribunal’ within a reasonable time.

The Court has determined what constitutes a reasonable time by taking into account the proceedings’ total duration, ‘from the initial procedural act until the final judgment’.⁹¹ The Court has considered four elements to analyse whether the guarantee of reasonable time was met, namely:

• The complexity of the matter;
• The procedural activity of the interested party;
• The conduct of the judicial authorities; and
• The effects on the legal situation of the person involved in the proceedings.

When investigating sexual violence, States must try ‘to avoid the re-victimization of the presumed victim or the re-experience of the profoundly traumatic incident’.⁹² A victim/survivor need not report the facts more than once ‘for the obligation to investigate to arise’.⁹³ States must not require victims/survivors of sexual violence to repeatedly describe the violence whenever they address the authorities.⁹⁴

During a criminal investigation into sexual violence, States should:⁹⁵

• Take the victim/survivor’s statement in a private, safe and comfortable environment. States should allow the victim/survivor to describe freely what they consider relevant and feel comfortable discussing;
• Record the victim/survivor’s statement to avoid or limit the need to repeat it;
• Provide the victim/survivor with medical, psychological and hygienic treatment on an emergency basis, ‘and continuously if required’, aimed at reducing the consequences of the rape;
• Have appropriate, trained and independent personnel immediately perform a complete and detailed medical and psychological examination.⁹⁶ Personnel should be of the sex preferred by the victim/survivor, and advise the victim/survivor that they may be accompanied by a person of confidence.

In cases of violence against women, the criminal investigation ‘should include a gender perspective and be conducted by officials with experience in similar cases and in providing attention to victims of discrimination and gender-based violence’.⁹⁷

A gender perspective includes trans women. If they have not yet done so, States must adopt a procedure for the recognition of gender identity so that anyone may amend their personal data in identity documents and public records, and to avoid conducting investigations in a discriminatory manner.⁹⁸ Proceedings that are not conducted with a gender-perspective are in breach of the State’s obligation under article 1(1) to respect and to ensure, without discrimination, the rights contained in the American Convention, including the right to equality before the law under article 24, and ‘the special obligations imposed by the Convention of Belém do Pará’.⁹⁹

As a rule, a gender perspective requires the use of evidentiary rules ‘that avoid stereotyped affirmations, insinuations and allusions’. The absence of a gender perspective may otherwise encourage the use of gender stereotypes in tribunals’ assessment of the evidence showing that a victim/survivor has suffered sexual violence, in violation of their human dignity.¹⁰⁰ Stereotypes reinforce the erroneously conceived and discriminatory idea that a victim/survivor of sexual violence has to be ‘weak’, appear ‘defenceless’, react or resist aggression.¹⁰¹

Case Study: Women Victims of Sexual Torture in Atenco v Mexico. In Women Victims of Sexual Torture in Atenco v Mexico, which concerned the commission of sexual violence against 11 women by Mexican police officers, the Court found that the State’s failure to conduct the investigation with a gender perspective could be seen in the flaws in the investigation’s initial stages, ‘especially in the collection and handling of the evidence’,¹⁰² including:

• The refusal to accept the complaints made by the women;
• The absence of medical and gynaecological care;
• The failure to conduct medical and psychological appraisals, especially gynaecological tests; and
• The deficient handling of the evidence collected. The authorities gave ‘excessive importance to the absence of physical evidence’.

The Court criticised the ‘discriminatory, stereotypical and re-victimizing statements and conducts’ in the case. Examples of such statements and conduct include raising questions about the victim/survivor’s behaviour, asking ‘what she had done to deserve what happened to her’, and opening lines of investigation into and drafting reports about the previous social or sexual conduct of the victims/survivors without their consent. The Court found that there was no justification as to how the victims/survivors’ social, family and economic history would be relevant to verify the facts and identify the perpetrators, and was also re-victimising.¹⁰³

Medical examinations. In cases of violence against women, States must have suitable, trained personnel perform a complete and detailed medical and psychological examination as soon as there is awareness of the alleged acts. Personnel should be of the sex indicated by the victim/survivor, and advise the victim/survivor that they may be accompanied by someone they trust. Examinations must be performed in accordance with protocols designed for documenting evidence in cases of gender-based violence, such as the Manual on Effective Investigation and Documentation of Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (Istanbul Protocol), and the World Health Organization’s Guidelines for Medico-Legal Care for Victims of Sexual Violence.¹⁰⁴

In cases in which signs of torture exist, medical examinations should be performed with the victim’s prior and informed consent and without the presence of security agents or other State agents.

States must consider the appropriateness of examinations of ‘sexual integrity’ on a case-by-case basis.¹⁰⁵ Personnel should perform a gynaecological and anal examination if appropriate, with the prior informed consent of the victim/survivor, during the first 72 hours after the act is reported. Gynaecological examinations may also be performed after the first 72 hours when evidence can be still found at a later point in time.

The authority requesting a gynaecological examination must provide detailed reasons for its appropriateness and, if this is not the case or if the victim/survivor has not given her informed consent, the authority should forgo the examination. This should not impact upon the victim/survivor’s credibility or be a reason not to initiate an investigation.¹⁰⁶

The use of force and/or ignoring a victim/survivor’s pain and discomfort in the course of medical examinations are never permissible.¹⁰⁷

In cases of sexual violence against a child or adolescent, States must adopt ‘special and particular measures’.¹⁰⁸

The Court has found that the Convention on the Rights of the Child provides States with guidance on how to protect the rights of children and adolescents through the application of four principles: the principle of non-discrimination, the principle of the child’s best interests, the principle of respect for the right to life, survival and development, and the principle of respect for the child’s opinion.¹⁰⁹

The principle of non-discrimination. The heightened vulnerability of children and adolescents to human right violations is influenced by different factors, such as age, their particular circumstances, and their level of development and maturity.¹¹⁰

Children and adolescents may face legal and financial obstacles and barriers that violate their autonomy or deprive them of legal assistance. States should remove these obstacles because they not only contribute to a denial of justice, but are discriminatory because they prevent children from accessing justice ‘in equal conditions’.¹¹¹

Girls’ vulnerability to human rights violations may be increased by historical discrimination that has contributed to women and girls’ greater exposure to sexual violence. Under article 9 of the Convention of Belém do Pará, when examining cases of violence against girls, States must consider their vulnerability due to their age.¹¹²

The principle of the child’s best interests. In all proceedings concerning children, States must prioritise their best interests.

To avoid revictimisation and allow the child or adolescent to play an effective role in criminal proceedings, States must provide children with special protection and specialised support, including psychosocial support, ‘from the moment the State becomes aware of the violation of the child’s human rights, and continuously, until those services cease to be necessary’.¹¹³

The principle of respect for the right to life, survival and development. Children subjected to sexual violence may suffer severe physical, psychological and emotional consequences, as well as victimisation at the hands of States when participating in criminal proceedings.

If a State considers that the participation of the child or adolescent is necessary and may contribute to gathering evidence, that State must avoid their revictimisation at all times and rely on their participation as little as possible, avoiding the presence of or interaction with the perpetrator.¹¹⁴

States must adopt measures of protection, including the provision of medical and psychosocial care, as soon as the facts are known. They must do so not only ‘before and during the investigations and the criminal proceedings’, but also afterwards to allow the child or adolescent to achieve recovery, rehabilitation and social reintegration, in light of their right to survival and integral development. States must extend those measures also to the victims/survivors’ family.¹¹⁵

The principle of respect for the opinion of the child. In all proceedings affecting children, States must ensure their participation ‘with due guarantees and within a reasonable time’.¹¹⁶ ‘

States must provide children and adolescents with:

• The necessary mechanisms to denounce offenses;
• The possibility to play an active role in judicial proceedings, to speak for themselves, and with legal counsel, ‘to defend their rights, according to their age and maturity’;
• The free legal assistance of a lawyer ‘specialized in childhood and adolescence’, regardless of their parents’ financial resources and opinion.¹¹⁷

To ensure children and adolescents’ right to be heard, States must conduct proceedings in an environment that is not intimidating, hostile, insensitive or inappropriate to the child, and that personnel working with the child/adolescent are qualified.¹¹⁸ States must train personnel, including administrative, judicial, prosecutorial and health authorities, in communicating with children and adolescents using language and terminology that are age-appropriate and non-stigmatising, offensive or discriminatory, and allow children and adolescents to recount their experiences in a manner of their choice.¹¹⁹

States must treat children and adolescents with tact and sensitivity throughout criminal proceedings, and explain the reasons for and utility of the procedures that will be conducted or the nature of the expert reports to which they will be subjected, based on their age, level of maturity and development.¹²⁰

States must give due weight to child victims/survivors’ views, while ‘respecting their privacy and the confidentiality of the information’. States must avoid their participation in interventions, their exposure to the public, causing them suffering during the proceedings and subjecting them to further harm.¹²¹

Impunity encourages the chronic repetition of human rights violations.¹²² To combat impunity, States must ‘ensure full access and legal standing to the victims or their next of kin at all the stages of the investigation and prosecution of those responsible’.¹²³

‘Next of kin’ includes ‘mothers and fathers, daughters and sons, and husbands, wives and permanent companions, as well as brothers and sisters’.¹²⁴ The victim/survivor’s next of kin may also be a victim.¹²⁵ In cases of sexual violence and torture, there is a rebuttable legal presumption of a violation of the next of kin’s mental and moral integrity,¹²⁶ meaning that the Court will recognise this violation unless the State disproves it.¹²⁷

Under articles 8(1) and 25(1) of the American Convention,¹²⁸ States must provide victims/survivors with access to justice, remove all obstacles to such access, in fact and in law,¹²⁹ and not obstruct the investigation process.¹³⁰ Obstacles to justice include:¹³¹

• ‘Coercion, intimidation or threats to witnesses, investigators or judges’ to hinder the process, avoid the clarification of the crimes, and conceal their perpetrators;¹³²
• Irregularities and unjustified delays because of the authorities’ lack of willingness and commitment to conduct criminal proceedings;¹³³
• Lack of access of the victims/survivors, their next of kin or their representatives, to the investigation and the proceedings;¹³⁴
• Alteration, concealment, attempts at bribery or the theft/destruction of evidence by State agents;¹³⁵
• Failure of States to collaborate with the authorities responsible for the investigation,¹³⁶ including the refusal to provide information that relates to a State secret;¹³⁷
• The use of military courts and tribunals ‘in facts that constitute human rights violations’;¹³⁸
• Application of laws to avoid responsibility.¹³⁹ In cases concerning grave violation of human rights, States may not apply amnesty laws, time limitations that prevent violations from being considered if not initiated within a period of time, ‘or any other similar mechanism that excludes responsibility, in order to waive its obligation to investigate and prosecute those responsible’;¹⁴⁰
• Defences of superior order.¹⁴¹ States must investigate possible links between those directly responsible and their superiors in the perpetration of torture, sexual violence and rape, ‘individualizing those responsible at all levels of decision’.¹⁴²

States must meet their obligations in good faith.¹⁴³ A State cannot justify its failure to initiate investigations into human rights violations by:

• Invoking the provisions of its domestic law; or
• Arguing that the violations were not prohibited at the time of their commission.¹⁴⁴

If authorities have obstructed or prevented the investigation of human rights violations, or are responsible for procedural irregularities that have prevented victims/survivors to obtain justice against perpetrators, States must open disciplinary, administrative or criminal actions against such authorities.¹⁴⁵

In light of the ‘physical and psychological scars’ that sexual violence causes victims/survivors and may cause their next of kin, States must provide them with medical, psychological or psychiatric treatment, including medication, free of charge and immediately through specialised health care institutions, in an adequate, comprehensive and effective manner, with the victims/survivors’ informed consent.

States must ensure that professionals in charge of the treatment ‘assess the victim’s psychological and physical conditions adequately’, and have sufficient training and experience to treat both the physical health problems and psychological traumas caused by torture and ill-treatment. If the victim/survivor is incarcerated, States must provide the professionals with access to places of detention, and allow them to transfer the victim/survivor to health care institutions, if needed. States must afford the same treatment to the next of kin, where appropriate.¹⁴⁶

Under article 25 of the American Convention, States must provide victims/survivors of human rights violations with effective judicial remedies.¹⁴⁷

Under article 63(1) of the American Convention, States must adequately repair any violation of an international obligation that has produced harm.¹⁴⁸

In the provision of reparations, States must consider not only the right of the victims/survivors to obtain reparation, but also adopt a gender and childhood perspective in their formulation and implementation.¹⁴⁹ As a rule, reparation of the harm caused by the violation of an international obligation requires, ‘provided this is possible, full restitution (restitutio in integrum)’, which consists in the re-establishment of the situation that existed before the harm occurred.¹⁵⁰

If this is not possible, as in most cases of human rights violations, States must adopt other measures to guarantee the rights that have been violated and to redress the violations. In addition to pecuniary compensation, including for the costs and expenses that victims/survivors may have incurred to obtain justice,¹⁵¹ ‘measures of restitution, rehabilitation and satisfaction, and guarantees of non-repetition have special relevance for the harm caused’.¹⁵²

Compensation. Compensation may cover both pecuniary and non-pecuniary damage. Pecuniary damage encompasses loss of or detriment to the victims’ income, the expenses incurred as a result of the human rights violations, and other pecuniary consequences caused by the violations.¹⁵³

Non-pecuniary damage may be more difficult to assess: it may include the suffering caused by the violation, the damage to values that are of great significance to the victim/survivor, as well as any non-pecuniary changes in the living conditions of the victims/survivors.

Since it is not possible to determine a precise monetary equivalent to non-pecuniary damage, States should compensate the victim/survivor through the payment of a sum of money or the delivery of goods or services with a monetary value.¹⁵⁴

Rehabilitation. States must provide victims/survivors of sexual violence with appropriate and rehabilitative care (see obligation III.13 in this subchapter).

Satisfaction. To ensure satisfaction, States may have to reopen investigations of sexual violence that were not conducted properly,¹⁵⁵ or offer public apologies. States responsible for human rights violations must publicly acknowledge international responsibility and apologise for those violations. States must agree on the nature and manner of the apology with the victims/survivors and/or their representatives.¹⁵⁶

If the Court has found against a State for its responsibility for acts of sexual violence, that State must publish the judgment’s official summary on an influential newspaper in an accessible format, and make the judgment available, for at least one year, on the government’s website.¹⁵⁷

Measures of satisfaction have been varied: for victims/survivors of sexual violence and their next of kin who suffered ‘changes in their life projects, with an impact on their personal and professional development’, including university studies, the Court has ordered the State responsible to grant scholarships in a public higher education establishment.¹⁵⁸

Guarantees of non-repetition. Guarantees of non-repetition may include the establishment of education and training programs (see obligation III.6 in this subchapter).¹⁵⁹