E/CN.4/1998/38 page 45 the Former Yugoslavia and for Rwanda) that crimes against humanity can occur whether or not committed in the course of armed conflict, international or national. It is further to be hoped that the threshold of application will not be unreasonably high. For instance, the scope of the practices may well be required to be systematic or widespread, but a prosecutor should not have to prove both elements. Moreover, individual incidents taking place in the context of the practice should be amenable to the proposed court’s jurisdiction. 224. Indeed, as far as torture is concerned, it has effectively been legislated as a crime under international law by the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, whether or not committed within the context of a more generalized practice, and it would be desirable that it be included as an independent basis of the proposed court’s jurisdiction. It is, of course, established as a crime against humanity provided the threshold elements are present. 225. In any event, it is assumed that in situations of armed conflict, the proposed court will be able to try individual cases of war crimes, including torture, whether committed as a grave breach of the four Geneva Conventions of 12 August 1949 in respect of international armed conflict or as a violation of the laws and customs of war as reflected in article 3 common to those Conventions. 226. For the proposed court to have international credibility and legitimacy, it will be essential for an international prosecutor to be able independently to initiate indictments of suspected perpetrators of crimes within the court’s jurisdiction. If such indictments were left to the decision of a political body, such as the Security Council, this could not but call into question the impartiality of international justice. Clearly there is no reason why the Security Council should not have a comparable power of referring situations or cases to the prosecutor. 227. Accordingly, the Special Rapporteur believes that the creation of an International Criminal Court with the characteristics described would be a monumental step towards the realization of international justice, not least because it would, in principle, permit an organ of the international community to override de jure or de facto impunity at the national level. 228. In this connection, the Special Rapporteur is aware of suggestions according to which nationally granted amnesties could be introduced as a bar to the proposed courts’ jurisdiction. He considers any such move subversive not just of the project at hand, but of international legality in general. It would gravely undermine the purpose of the proposed court, by permitting States to legislate their nationals out of the jurisdiction of the court. It would undermine international legality, because it is axiomatic that States may not invoke their own law to avoid their obligations under international law. Since international law requires States to penalize the types of crime contemplated in the draft statute of the court in general, and torture in particular, and to bring perpetrators to justice, the amnesties in question are, ipso facto, violations of the concerned States’ obligations to bring violators to justice. Any such proposed move would be to turn things on their head, allowing national law to dictate international legal obligation.