CCPR/C/130/D/3599/2019 4.2 In February and March 2019, a public consultation on a draft royal decree concerning the establishment of a national census of victims of the Civil War and the dictatorship was held. The aim of this decree, which is still in the drafting stage, is to create a database on enforced disappearances. 4.3 With regard to exhumations of mass graves, the State party affirms that work has begun on updating an exhumation protocol dating from 2011 and that some autonomous communities, including that of the Balearic Islands, envisage adopting such a protocol. 4.4 The State party argues that access to the archives of the State law enforcement and security agencies was already guaranteed by the Historical Memory Act (article 22 of which establishes a requirement to adopt measures to promote the protection and use of such archives) and that the Ministry of Defence has adopted two resolutions, in November 2018 and January 2019, which extended access to document collections belonging to the general military archive of Ávila, the military archives of Barcelona, Ferrol, Melilla, Ceuta and Guadalajara, and the general archive and historical archive of the air force. 4.5 The State party also reports that efforts will be made to encourage the production of teaching materials on violations committed during the Civil War and the dictatorship for primary, lower secondary and upper secondary (baccalaureate) school students and adults undertaking continuing education. Use of such materials will also be promoted at the university level. Further research into the repression suffered by women will be promoted and plans to train and raise awareness among public officials are in place. 4.6 Firstly, the State party maintains that the communication is inadmissible ratione materiae because the search for reparation and justice for victims of enforced disappearance is covered not by the Covenant but by the International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance. Therefore, the authors’ complaint should be submitted to the Committee on Enforced Disappearances. 4.7 Secondly, the State party argues that the communication is inadmissible ratione personae because it constitutes an actio popularis in that it is intended to serve as a comprehensive critique of legislation and court proceedings. 4.8 Thirdly, the State party claims that the communication is inadmissible ratione temporis because the Committee has no jurisdiction over events that occurred before the existence of the Covenant.23 4.9 Lastly, the State party also claims that the communication is inadmissible for failure to exhaust domestic remedies since the legal proceedings were brought by the association and not directly by the authors and the administrative proceedings that they have initiated have been challenged. 4.10 In the light of these four grounds of inadmissibility, the State party requests that admissibility be considered separately from the merits, and also states that a public ceremony might be organized to recognize the authors as victims. Authors’ comments on the State party’s observations on admissibility 5.1 On 9 September 2019, the authors argued that none of the alleged grounds of inadmissibility is valid and that the State party’s request that admissibility be examined separately from the merits, in addition to being submitted late, is a clear strategy to delay the proceedings. They therefore request that it be rejected. 5.2 As to the alleged lack of competence ratione materiae, the authors point out that the State party’s argument illustrates its ignorance of the jurisprudence of the Committee, which has examined cases of enforced disappearance. 5.3 With regard to the alleged lack of competence ratione personae, the authors maintain that the requirement to prove a specific violation of rights is satisfied,24 because, although 23 24 GE.21-06035 See Yurich v. Chile and Acuña Inostroza et al. v. Chile (CCPR/C/66/D/717/1996). Human Rights Committee, Aumeeruddy-Cziffra et al. v. Mauritius, communication No. 35/1978, para. 9.2. 9