A/HRC/4/33 page 11 39. On 15 December 2006, the Special Rapporteur was invited by the University of Nottingham, United Kingdom, to deliver a lecture entitled, “Challenges to the absolute prohibition of torture.” 40. On 19 and 20 December 2006, the Special Rapporteur was invited by the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights to participate in an expert consultation on “Indicators for monitoring compliance with international human rights instruments”, in Geneva. III. THE OBLIGATION OF STATES PARTIES TO ESTABLISH UNIVERSAL JURISDICTION ACCORDING TO THE PRINCIPLE AUT DEDERE AUT IUDICARE 41. One of the major aims of the Convention against Torture is the criminalization of torture and the enforcement under criminal law of the ban on torture. To this end the Convention obliges States parties to designate and define torture as a specific crime in national legislation. Furthermore, in order for such crimes to be adequately prosecuted, the Convention provides for extensive jurisdictional powers and obligations. With the purpose of avoiding safe havens for perpetrators of torture, the Convention goes beyond the traditional principles of territorial and national jurisdiction (listed in articles 5 (1) (a)-(c)) and applies, for the first time in a human rights treaty, the principle of universal jurisdiction (art. 5 (2))1 as an international obligation of all States parties without any precondition other than the presence of the alleged torturer. 42. However, despite this impressive machinery, the Special Rapporteur notes that, with few exceptions, States remain extremely reluctant to make use of their rights and obligations under the Convention to exercise universal jurisdiction. Almost 20 years after the entry into force of the Convention, very few States have actually exercised universal jurisdiction over torture offences in practice.2 One explanation for this phenomenon is that States have tended to interpret their obligations under article 5 (2) in a very restrictive manner. Some States have argued, for instance, that the exercise of universal jurisdiction is dependent upon the prior existence of a request for extradition (e.g. the Al-Duri case in Austria).3 In fact, both the 1 According to article 5 (2) of the Convention, “Each State Party shall … take such measures as may be necessary to establish its jurisdiction over [torture] offences in cases where the alleged offender is present in any territory under its jurisdiction and it does not extradite him …”. 2 The proceedings against the late dictator of Chile, General Augusto Pinochet Ugarte, constitute probably the best known case relating to universal jurisdiction under the Convention against Torture. On 23 March 1999 the highest court in the United Kingdom, the House of Lords, decided that the former Chilean Head of State was not immune from being extradited to Spain to stand trial for certain human rights crimes committed in Chile. Re Pinochet [1999] 2 WLR 272; 38 ILM 432 (1999). 3 Izzat Ibrahim Khalil Al-Duri was the deputy of Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein, held responsible for alleged systematic torture practices. He went to Vienna in August 1999 for medical treatment. Austrian NGOs and members of the Green Party requested the Austrian authorities to detain him and exercise universal jurisdiction in accordance with article 5 (2). However, the Austrian authorities argued that universal jurisdiction was not an obligation, but