84
166. Consequently, this Court considers that the State has not adopted the
necessary measures for the members of the Community to leave the roadside, and
thus, abandon the inadequate conditions that endangered, and continue
endangering, their right to life.
*
167. As regards to the provisional measures, the Court notices that in Paraguay,
domestic legislation (supra para. 73(72)) grants indigenous peoples the right to
receive free medical care in public health centers, and they are exempted from
paying for all medical check-ups, tests and other medical procedures carried out at
the Hospital Nacional de Itaugua (Itaugua National Hospital) and at all the other
medical centers of the country within the jurisdiction of the Ministerio de Salud
Pública y Bienestar Social (Ministry of Public Health and Social Welfare)217 (supra
para. 73(72).) Likewise, the Court acknowledges and appreciates the initiative
promoted by Paraguay by the adoption of Presidential Order Nº 3789 (supra paras.
73(62) and (63),) for the delivery of a certain amount of food, medical-sanitary
attention and educational material to such Community. However, the Court
considers, as in many other occasions,218 that legislation alone is not enough to
guarantee the full effectiveness of the rights protected by the Convention, but
rather, such guarantee implies certain governmental conducts to ensure the actual
existence of an efficient guarantee of the free and full exercise of human rights.
168. In the instant case, together with the lack of lands, the life of the members of
the Sawhoyamaxa Community is characterized by unemployment, illiteracy,
morbidity rates caused by evitable illnesses, malnutrition, precarious conditions in
their dwelling places and environment, limitations to access and use health services
and drinking water, as well as marginalization due to economic, geographic and
cultural causes (supra paras. 73(61) to (74).)
169. During the two years following the submission by Miguel Chase-Sardi of the
anthropological report to the INDI, communicating the precarious situation of the
Community and the death of several children, the State did not take any specific
measure to prevent the violation of the right to life of the alleged victims. During
that period, at least four persons died (supra para. 73(74)(2), (3), (4) and (21).)
170. It was not until June 23, 1999 that the President of the Republic of Paraguay
issued the aforementioned Presidential Order Nº 3789 declaring the Sawhoyamaxa
Community in a state of emergency. However, the measures adopted by the State in
compliance with such order cannot be considered sufficient and adequate. Indeed,
for six years after the effective date of the order, the State only delivered food to the
alleged victims on ten opportunities, and medicine and educational material in two
opportunities, with long intervals between each delivery (supra para. 73(64) to
(66).) These deliveries, as well as the amounts delivered, are obviously insufficient
to revert the situation of vulnerability and risk of the members of this Community
and to prevent violations to the right to life, to the point that after the emergency
217
Cf. Affidavit of César Escobar-Cattebecke, dated February 18, 2005, supra note 143, and circular
S.G No. 1 of the Ministerio of Salud Pública y Bienestar Social [Ministry of Public Health and Social
Welfare,] dated February 24, 2005, supra note 143.
218
Cf. Case of the Pueblo Bello Massacre, supra note 3, para. 142.