The separate Inter-American Court of Human Rights is an autonomous judicial institution based in the city of San José, Costa Rica.

[3] The IACHR is a permanent body, with headquarters in Washington, D.C., United States,[4] and it meets in regular and special sessions several times a year to examine allegations of human rights violations in the hemisphere.

It held its first meeting in 1960, and it conducted its first on-site visit to inspect the human rights situation in the Dominican Republic in 1961.

[9] A major step in the development of the system was taken in 1965 when the commission was expressly authorized to examine specific cases of human rights violations.

The commissioners are elected by the OAS General Assembly, for four-year terms, with the possibility of re-election on one occasion, for a maximum period in office of eight years.

34) says that they must "be persons of high moral character and recognized competence in the field of human rights".

[25] The staff of the IACHR comprise its Secretariat, which is led by an Executive Secretary, who serves for what have recently been four-year, renewable contracts.

[26] The Commissioners of the IACHR had unanimously approved the contract extension in January 2020,[26] and expressed their "profound rejection" of Almagro's action "whose refusal to renew this contract breaks with a 20-year practice of respecting the IACHR's decision to appoint its own Executive Secretary and thus makes it difficult to obtain truth, justice, and reparation for those whose labor rights have been affected."