INVESTIGATIVE POWERS
Both the TC and CEH were established to be definitively independent of the juridical realm.
The Salvadoran commission mandate in the April 1991 Mexico Agreements set these
boundaries, asserting that the TC was not to “prevent the normal investigation of any situation or
case … nor the application of the relevant legal provisions to any act that is contrary to law.” I I°
The CEH mandate explicitly states that its “work, recommendations and report…shall [not] have
any judicial aim or effect.” 111 Although some wished that the truth commissions had been
allowed more direct effect on impunity in the two countries, the logistical separation of the TC
and CEH from any judicial processes made them more acceptable to the conservative
government, economic elite, and military powers — and therefore possible. The Salvadoran and
Guatemalan society had to take what it could get. Unfortunately, what they got were bodies with
very little investigative clout.
52Both the TC and the CEH were created with the handicap of no legal powers of subpoena,
search, or seizure. Without the power to lawfully require the appearance of certain individuals
before the commission, the means to compel the surrender of evidence, or the right to search any
premises where relevant archives could be stored or hidden, 112 the amount of incriminating
information to which they could gain access on their own was considerably reduced. They had to
rely on voluntary information of truth-testimonies and on the responsiveness of the government,
ministry of defense, FMLN or URNG, media sources, and civil society to specific requests. The
investigation process became a test of others’ cooperation.
Tags: legal powers, ministry of defense, subpoena, testimonies