Wednesday, December 3, 2014

Too Immune?


If you have watched Law & Order or Lethal Weapon 2 at some point in your life, then you probably know what diplomatic immunity is, or at least understand the basic concept. But what is it really, and how far will it stretch over and protect those that have it assigned to them? Is it just something to walk around and gloat with, or is it actually helpful?

Diplomatic immunity is “immunity from the criminal jurisdiction of the receiving State enjoyed by the members of the diplomatic staff, and of the administrative and technical staff and of the service staff of the mission.” In simpler terms, it is the privilege of exemption from certain laws and taxes granted to diplomats by the country in which they are working. This idea was officially agreed upon in 1961 as part of the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations. Today, there are 187 countries that allow and provide diplomatic immunity.

The difficulty with diplomatic immunity is that it puts nations in a bind when the “Diplomatic Immunity Card” is played. The privilege was initially granted, in essence, to provide strong relationships between countries. So what would you do if you were the head of a government and someone from another country’s government, who operated his job within your country’s borders, was accused of a petty crime and decided to say that he was exempt from committing that crime due to his diplomatic immunity? Would you have him convicted of the crime because your policy is that everyone needs to understand the law, or will you let it slide because your true desire is to have a more peaceful and less strenuous partnership with the diplomat’s country? Odds are that you would take international harmony, trust, and partnership over international discourse, which is what the previously used situation really boils down to.


To really put this into perspective, here are some actual uses of diplomatic immunity and their results. (1) Zaire officials were sued by their landlord for neglecting to pay the rent, which compiled to a debt of $400,000. This is when the U.S. State Department stepped in, saying that the Zaireans were protected from paying by diplomatic immunity. The case ended when a circuit court agreed with the diplomatic immunity statement. (2) In 1996, United Nations diplomats in New York managed to rack up 143,508 parking violations, which comes to a hefty amount of $15.8 million dollars in fines. Of those 140,000+ summons, diplomatic immunity cleared each and every one of them. (3) Here is an example of exercised diplomatic immunity outside of the United States. In 1979, the Burmese Ambassador to Sri Lanka used his “Diplomatic Immunity Card” to weasel his way out of murder. One night, the Burmese Ambassador waited at home for his wife to return. Reportedly, she was having an affair with a member of a Sri Lanka band. Upon her arrival, he shot her. The next morning, he set up a funeral pyre in the backyard on their property in Sri Lanka. In front of neighbors and police officers, the Ambassador threw his wife into the flames. When the police came to arrest him, he said that they could not enter because his house was on Burmese soil. The Burmese government responded by taking him out of Sri Lanka, and he was never charged.


So diplomatic immunity has been used as an excuse for murder, tax evasion, rent negligence, parking wherever you feel like parking, drug trafficking, sex trafficking, and slavery. Personally, I understand why we have diplomatic immunity. It helps establish soundness within the relations of governments. However, I also do not believe that your importance to your government should affect how you are treated within another country’s borders when it comes to crime. It does not matter whether you are the President of a European country, the son of a Middle Eastern diplomat, a desperate parent in an impoverished town, or a serial killer. None of these situations can give you the right to escape the law. I understand that there is no pure justice within the legal system, but I do believe that eliminating diplomatic immunity can be a start.

If you commit the crime, you should be held accountable.

Here is a video providing examples of diplomatic immunity being used:



Here are the links to the sources used for this post:





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