A/HRC/47/26 50. Rule 96 provided that no corroboration was required of the testimony of a victim of sexual violence. It specifically excluded the admissibility of the victim’s prior sexual conduct and restricted defence based on consent, constituting significant advancements in international criminal procedural law on rape. 51. The next benchmark for the criminalization of rape and the definition of its constituent elements was the adoption in 1998 of the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court. The Rome Statute established an important link with international human rights law in its article 21 (3), according to which the application and interpretation of law by the Court must be consistent with internationally recognized human rights. Rape, sexual slavery, enforced prostitution, forced pregnancy, enforced sterilization and other forms of sexual violence are enumerated under article 7 as crimes against humanity and under article 8 as war crimes in the context of both international and non-international armed conflict. 52. The Elements of Crimes of the Rome Statute contains the following definition of the crime of rape, in relation to article 7 (1) (g): (a) The perpetrator invaded the body of a person by conduct resulting in penetration, however slight, of any part of the body of the victim or of the perpetrator with a sexual organ, or of the anal or genital opening of the victim with any object or any other part of the body; (b) The invasion was committed by force, or by threat of force or coercion, such as that caused by fear of violence, duress, detention, psychological oppression or abuse of power, against such person or another person, or by taking advantage of a coercive environment, or the invasion was committed against a person incapable of giving genuine consent.47 53. This definition explicitly refers to consent in its second paragraph, with respect to “a person incapable of giving genuine consent”, and the footnote to that paragraph clarifies that it is understood that a person may be incapable of giving genuine consent if affected by natural, induced or age-related incapacity. This broadens the interpretation of incapacity by including induced incapacity, as a result, for instance, of drugs or alcohol. It also includes age-related incapacity, relating to children below the age of sexual consent. 54. There has been criticism of this definition as it only implicitly includes lack of consent, but it remains to be determined by the Court whether to consider lack of consent as a key element of the definition of rape in specific cases.48 The Court is invited to implement the provisions of the Rome Statute in accordance with human rights standards, which have also evolved and now require the inclusion of the lack of consent as a central element of rape. 55. In April 2013, the Declaration on Preventing Sexual Violence in Conflict was adopted by the Group of Eight, and was later supported by 150 States. In the Declaration, ministers recalled that rape and other forms of serious sexual violence in armed conflict were war crimes and also constituted grave breaches of the Geneva Conventions and their Protocol I, and that States had an obligation to search for and prosecute (or hand over for trial) any individual alleged to have committed or ordered a grave breach regardless of nationality.49 C. Evolution of the Security Council framework on rape under its resolution 1325 (2000) 56. The Security Council, by the adoption of its landmark resolution 1325 (2000), on women and peace and security, and nine follow-up resolutions, has identified sexual violence, inclusive of rape, as a threat to international peace and security and established its framework for addressing sexual violence in armed conflict. 57. In its resolution 1820 (2008), the Security Council notes that rape and other forms of sexual violence can constitute a war crime, a crime against humanity or a constitutive act 47 48 49 10 ICC-ASP/1/3 and Corr.1, part II.B, art. 7 (1) (g)-1, paras. 1–2. Submission by Eithne Dowds, pp. 6–7. See www.un.org/ruleoflaw/blog/document/g8-declaration-on-preventing-sexual-violence-in-conflict.