In 1993 the South African Parliament adopted an Interim Constitution which came into effect on April 27, 1994 [33 I.L.M. 1043 (1994)]. This Constitution, which brought to an end 40 years of apartheid, was negotiated by political groups which in most instances were unelected and simply reflected the political realities of the time. For this reason it was approved only as an Interim Constitution pending the adoption of a final Constitution by a democratically elected Parliament sitting as a Constitutional Assembly. However, as the 1993 Interim Constitution was a political compromise between rival groups, it was agreed that the final Constitution would have to comply with 34 Constitutional Principles contained in the 1993 Constitution and that a Constitutional Court would be empowered to pronounce on the compliance of the final Constitution with these principles.

The Preparatory Committee will meet three times in 1997 and one time in 1998 to complete the drafting of a convention on the establishment of an international criminal court; a diplomatic conference of plenipotentiaries will be held in 1998; the UN Secretary-General will establish a fund for participation of the least developed countries in the work of the Preparatory Committee and the diplomatic conference.

Prior to the amendment, the non–commercial tort exception to sovereign immunity, 28 U.S.C. §1605(a)(5), barred tort claims against foreign states where the tort and the resulting injury did not occur in the United States. New §1605(a)(7) denies immunity to states in suits involving torture, extrajudicial killing, hostage taking, and aircraft sabotage, committed outside the U.S. by an official, employee or agent of the offending state while acting within the scope of his employment or agency. The respondent state must have been designated by the Executive as a state sponsor of terrorism. To fall within this new jurisdictional grant, the claim must meet several preconditions, each of which has dispositive jurisdictional significance.