relatives have an arguable claim that a member of their family has disappeared at the hand of the authorities, or where a right with as fundamental an importance as the right to life is at stake, Article 13 requires, in addition to the payment of compensation where appropriate, a thorough and effective investigation, capable of leading to the identification and punishment of those responsible and including effective access for the relatives to the investigatory procedure.”222 Other obligations by States to ensure an effective remedy The use of military courts • The HRCt and the IACtHR have both developed jurisprudence on the positive obligation to adopt legislative measures. For instance, in the case of Molina Theissen v. Guatemala, the IACtHR reaffirmed that “States Parties are under the obligation to adopt legislative or other measures required to make the rights and liberties protected by said Convention effective.”229 Similarly, the HRCt has urged States to modify their legislation to ensure that: • The ICPPED requires States to abide by a series of obligations, including to codify ED as a separate criminal offence under their domestic legislation;225 to thoroughly investigate allegations of ED;226 to establish jurisdiction over the offence of ED;227 and to establish effective guarantees for persons deprived of their liberty.228 • A separate but related issue concerns the competence of military tribunals to adjudicate on cases of ED. Article IX of the Inter-American Convention on Forced Disappearance of Persons provides that “[p]ersons alleged to be responsible for the acts constituting the offence of forced disappearance of persons may be tried only in the competent jurisdictions of ordinary law in each state, to the exclusion of all other special jurisdictions, particularly military jurisdictions.” • the perpetrators of ED are prosecuted and punished, in situations where this crime is not explicitly defined in domestic criminal law;230 • This is supported by the jurisprudence of the IACtHR, which has stated that: “when the military courts assume jurisdiction over a matter that should be heard by the ordinary courts, the right to the natural judge is violated as is, a fortiori, due process; this, in turn, is intimately linked to the right to access to justice itself. As the Court has previously established, the judge in charge of hearing a case must be competent, independent and impartial”.223 • relatives of disappeared persons have access to the investigation of the crime of ED;231 and • relatives of the victims of ED are not required to obtain death certificates for the victim as a condition of receiving social benefits and relief.232 • Individual remedies in cases of ED often include conducting an effective investigation into the disappearance of the victim and providing the family with detailed information about its results; releasing the victim immediately if he/she is still being held incommunicado; if the victim is deceased, returning his/her remains to his/her family; prosecuting, trying and punishing those responsible for the violations that were committed; providing ade- • In a statement on the competence of military tribunals, the UN Committee on Enforced Disappearances (“CED”) reaffirmed that “military jurisdiction ought to be excluded in cases of gross human rights violations, including enforced disappearance”.224 222 ECtHR, Tanis and others v. Turkey, Appl. No. 65899/01, 2 August 2005, para. 235; see also ECtHR, Aksoy v. Turkey, Appl. No. 100/1995/606/694, 18 December 1996, para. 98. 223 IACtHR, 19 Comerciantes v. Colombia, Judgment, 5 July 2004, para. 167; See also Masacre de Pueblo Bello v. Colombia, judgment of 31 January 2006, para. 189; Masacre de Mapiripan v Colombia, judgment of 15 September 2005, para. 202. 224 Committee on Enforced Disappearances (“CED”), Report of the Committee on Enforced Disappearances on its Eighth Session, February 2015, Geneva. 225 ICPPED, Article 4. 226 Ibid, Article 12. 227 Ibid, Article 9. 228 Ibid, Article 17. 229 IACtHR, Molina Theissen v. Guatemala, Series C No. 108, 3 July 2004, para. 89. 230 HRCt, Ram Kumar Bhandari v. Nepal, Communication No. 2031/2011, para. 10; Basnet v. Sri Lanka, Communication No. 2051/2011, para. 10. 231 HRCt, Hero v. Bosnia and Herzegovina, Communication No. 1966/2010, 27 November 2014, para. 11; Kozljak v. Bosnia and Herzegovina, Communication No. 1970/2010, 1 December 2014, para. 11. 232 HRCt, Hero v. Bosnia and Herzegovina, Communication No. 1966/2010, 27 November 2014, para. 11. 35