Chapter 2 • The Major Universal Human Rights Instruments and the Mechanisms for Their Implementation The International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination prohibits such discrimination in the enjoyment of human rights in all fields of public life. States parties must however also ensure that, whenever private institutions influence the exercise of rights or the availability of opportunities, the result has neither the purpose nor the effect of creating or perpetuating racial discrimination. The Convention is implemented at the international level through: (1) a reporting procedure; (2) inter-State complaints; and (3) individual communications. 2.6 The Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, 1984 Although outlawed by all the major human rights treaties, the widespread practice of torture was considered to require more detailed legal regulation and more efficient implementation machinery. It was therefore decided to draft a Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, which was adopted by the United Nations General Assembly on 10 December 1984. It entered into force on 26 June 1987, and, as of 8 April 2002, there were 128 States parties to the Convention. The Convention created an expert body, the Committee against Torture, to supervise the implementation of the obligations of the States parties. 2.6.1 The undertakings of the States parties According to the Convention, “the term ‘torture’ means any act by which severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental, is intentionally inflicted on a person for such purposes as obtaining from him or a third person information or a confession, punishing him for an act he or a third person has committed or is suspected of having committed, or intimidating or coercing him or a third person, or for any reason based on discrimination of any kind, when such pain or suffering is inflicted by or at the instigation of or with the consent or acquiescence of a public official or other person acting in an official capacity”. However, “it does not include pain or suffering arising only from, inherent in or incidental to lawful sanctions” (art. 1). Next, the Convention requires that “each State Party shall take effective legislative, administrative, judicial or other measures to prevent acts of torture in any territory under its jurisdiction” (art. 2(1); emphasis added). It further specifies that “no exceptional circumstances whatsoever, whether a state of war or a threat of war, internal political instability or any other public emergency, may be invoked as a justification of torture” (art. 2(2); emphasis added). This is simply a restatement of already existing international human rights law, given that the right to freedom from torture is made non-derogable in the major relevant treaties, including the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. 54 Human Rights in the Administration of Justice: A Manual on Human Rights for Judges, Prosecutors and Lawyers