CAT/C/34/D/212/2002 page 5 4.2 As to the merits, the State party maintains that the victim of a crime has no right to block a pardon, the granting of which is a prerogative of the King acting in accordance with the Constitution. It claims that, according to the position adopted by the human rights treaty bodies, victims have no right to ask for anyone to be convicted, and accordingly it would be a contradiction to grant them the right to block a pardon. When a crime is investigated ex officio, the granting of a pardon does not provide for the victim’s involvement and, therefore, the interests of the victim of the crime are unaffected. The State party adds that it was the civil guards themselves who requested the pardon. 4.3 The State party claims that the complainant received the full compensation awarded to him by the court. 4.4 The State party indicates that, until such time as a guilty verdict was handed down in the complainant’s case, the accused went about their business as normal, which included one of them taking a course of studies with a view to promotion, as anyone is legally entitled to do in the absence of measures affecting their rights. Upon conviction, the civil guards lodged an application for pardon with the Vizcaya provincial court, with the request that the sentence should not be carried out until a decision had been reached on their request for a pardon. Although the court did not manage to order execution of the sentence, the complainant could have asked it to. Once the pardon had been granted, the civil guards were suspended from duty for one month and one day. Complainant’s comments on the State party’s observations regarding the admissibility and merits of the complaint 5.1 On the admissibility of the complaint, the complainant indicates that, in the circumstances of his case, there were no domestic remedies against the granting of a pardon. He adds that neither the 1870 statute on pardons nor the position adopted by the Constitutional Court permits a private individual to object to a pardon. He cites the Constitutional Court judgement of 5 October 1990, which says that pardons “as a gesture of grace, shall be decided upon by the executive and granted by the King. Such decisions shall not be examined on their merits by the courts, including this Constitutional Court”. The complainant maintains that the most recent judgements of the Constitutional Court, those handed down between January and March 2001, did not introduce a means of appealing against pardons but merely gave the sentencing court a certain degree of procedural control. The victim is not informed that a pardon has been granted and is thus denied the opportunity to appeal. The complainant states that the pardons procedure specifies that the victim of the pardoned crime should be given a hearing. He objected to the pardons when consulted, but his views were not binding. 5.2 On the merits, the complainant maintains that the pardon granted by the authorities to civil guards convicted of torture is incompatible with the purpose and object of the Convention, inasmuch as it calls into question the absolute nature of the prohibition of torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment. Granting pardons creates a climate of impunity that encourages State officials to commit further acts of torture. When the pardon was granted, the accused’s