A/HRC/45/CRP.11 363. The judge in that case, Ralenis Tovar, has declared that when signing the arrest warrant for Leopoldo López, she was sitting before a large number of officers of the state intelligence services and the Bolivarian National Guard and four national prosecutors, and she was threatened with becoming the “next Judge Afiuni”.831 Civilians facing Military Justice 364. Under the Constitution, “the jurisdiction of military courts is limited to crimes of a military nature” and ordinary crimes, human rights violations and crimes against humanity are subject to ordinary jurisdiction.832 While this does not exclude civilians from the jurisdiction of military courts, crimes of military nature are by definition those related to breaches of military duties and therefore in principle can only be committed by military in service.833 365. Traditionally, there has been a restrictive interpretation of military jurisdiction. 834 However, especially since April 2017, the Mission documented an increasingly frequent use of military jurisdiction to prosecute and try civilians. 835 According to the information gathered by the Mission, this increase coincided with the conflict between Luisa Ortega Díaz, former Attorney General, and the executive, starting in March 2017 following her public criticism of the Government.836 366. Military judges and prosecutors are active members of the armed forces, subjected to military hierarchy and to the authority of the Minister of Defence and the President.837 The principle of independence of justice, enshrined in the Constitution of Venezuela, 838 necessarily implies that all tribunals and judges be independent from the executive and legislative powers. Military tribunals are per definition a specialized jurisdiction, hence their use for civilians is a deviation from the principle of “natural judge” as enshrined in article 49(4) of the Constitution.839 In this respect, international human rights bodies and the InterAmerican Court on Human Rights have consistently recommended that military jurisdiction be limited to military crimes committed by military personnel. 840 831 832 833 834 835 836 837 838 839 840 94 Testimony of Ralenis Tovar at the Hearing of the OAS General Secretariat to analyze the possible commission of crimes against humanity in Venezuela, 16 October 2017, minute 13:00, available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ca5zYBQYcVE. 1999 Constitution, art. 261. See also art. 29. See however article 123 of the Organic Code on Military Justice, according to which military criminal jurisdiction includes all military infractions committed by military or civilians, jointly or separately. See, e.g., Judgment of 24 April 2002, Case file No. 01-2721, in which the Constitutional Chamber of the Supreme Court observed that “military justice only applies to crimes of a military nature perpetrated by military personnel on active duty, both for the opportunity they are committed and for the date of his judgment”. This has been recently confirmed by the Supreme Court in its judgments 70 and 71 of 30 July 2020. See, TalCual Digital, TSJ de Maduro reconoce que juicio militar a Rubén González viola sus derechos humanos, available at: https://talcualdigital.com/tsj-de-maduroreconoce-que-juicio-militar-a-ruben-gonzalez-viola-sus-derechos-humanos/. According to information received from Foro Penal, between 2014 and 2020 866 civilians have been tried by military courts, 773 of whom in 2017 only. See Acceso a la Justicia, 7 preguntas sobre la Justicia Militar, February 2018, available at: https://www.accesoalajusticia.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/Investigación-sobre-JusticiaMilitar.pdf and New York Times, El gobierno venezolano recurre a la justicia militar ‘como si estuviera en guerra’, 12 May 2017, available at: https://www.nytimes.com/es/2017/05/12/espanol/america-latina/venezuela-tribunales-militaresmaduro.html. Organic Code of Military Justice, arts. 28, 49, 54 and 55, available at: https://docs.venezuela.justia.com/federales/codigos/codigo-organico-de-justicia-militar.pdf. See also CCPR/C/VEN/CO/R.4, para. 16 and Inter-American Court of Human Rights, Usón Ramírez Vs. Venezuela, Judgment of 20 November 2009, Series C No. 207, para. 111. Articles 26, 49 and 254. “Everyone has the right to be tried by their natural judges in ordinary or special jurisdictions, with the guarantees established in this Constitution and in the law […]”. See United Nations Basic Principles on the Independence of the Judiciary (1985), principle 5; General Comment of the Human Rights Committee no. 32, Article 14, Right to equality before courts and