Chapter 2 The Right to Nationality and Judgment TC/0168/13 of the Constitutional Court | 107 Commission considers that the reasons underlying the interpretation and decision taken by the Constitutional Court in judgment TC/0168/13, as well as previous practices, standards, and decisions, pertain to a context of structural discrimination based mainly on racial and ethnic criteria, which have disproportionately affected Dominican persons of Haitian descent born in the Dominican Republic, especially those of African descent of darker skin color. Hence, it is a violation of the right to equal protection of the law recognized in Article 24 of the American Convention, which provides that: “All persons are equal before the law. Consequently, they are entitled, without discrimination, to equal protection of the law.” 249. Furthermore, the Commission considers that one principle of the protection of human rights that must be taken into account by any public authority, such as the Dominican Republic’s Constitutional Court, is that when addressing or resolving a situation that could have an impact on a person’s human rights, it must always opt for the alternative most conducive to the protection of human rights. Here, the InterAmerican Court has written that “when interpreting the Convention it is always necessary to choose the alternative that is most favorable to protection of the rights enshrined in said treaty, based on the principle of the rule most favorable to the human being.” 254 Faced with an ambiguous legal provision that can be reasonably interpreted in two different ways, the principle of pro persona requires that the interpretation most favorable to the protection of human rights be selected. Consequently, no interpretation of a constitutional provision can be in violation of the principle of pro persona, and anyone who applies such an interpretation is acting outside the law. 250. It is contrary to international legal order and the international obligations undertaken by the Dominican State in the area of human rights that a law intended to protect the right to nationality should be interpreted in a manner that is at variance with the law’s language and purpose. In other words, the exception made to the rule conferring nationality on the basis of jus soli in the case of children of foreigners in transit cannot be interpreted in such a way as to arbitrarily deprive persons of their nationality when they were born on Dominican territory or acquired Dominican nationality in accordance with the provisions of the Constitution and the law and the practices in force at the time of their birth, without there being a provision in the Constitution that establishes a foundation for the Constitutional Court’s interpretation. Thus, the Constitutional Court’s interpretation violated the pro persona principle. Following this line of thought, interpretations that establish limits or lead to the denial of a given right must be narrow in scope. Thus, rules that an interpreter pretends to extrapolate from a provision of the law, in violation of the pro persona principle, have no legal validity. 254 or persons of Haitian descent have in obtaining personal identity documents and their vulnerable situation has already been discussed (supra par. 171). See, I/A Court H.R., Compulsory Membership in an Association Prescribed by Law for the Practice of Journalism (Arts. 13 and 29 American Convention on Human Rights). Advisory Opinion OC-5/85 of November 13, 1985. Series A No. 5, par. 52; Case of the Mapiripán Massacre v. Colombia, par. 106; Case of Atala Riffo and Daughters v. Chile. Merits, Reparations and Costs. Judgment of February 24, 2012. Series C No. 239, para. 84. Inter-American Commission on Human Rights | IACHR