As the human civilization advanced throughout time, it started to form centralized forms of authority, which later became states. States ruled over a defined group of people, and as various civilizations started to interact with one another, official relations among states were established. Embassies were created and ambassadors started to represent their state at a certain level depending on the relation between the two states.
These relationships are often referred to as “diplomatic missions.”
The individuals who worked as representatives of their states are called diplomats, and these representatives often faced mistreatment under the state of organization they were working in. These mistreatments vary at a range of deportation, imprisonment, and even capital punishment. Acts of terror against diplomats and diplomatic started to become a method of retaliation over the course of time, and it was not until the formation of the United Nations that passed international legislations to ensure the inviolability of diplomats.
Diplomacy
The word diplomacy originates from Ancient Greek, where this concept was firstly created among citystates. In Greek, the word means, “official document referring to a privilege”. The early examples of diplomacy are seen in Ancient China,
Mesopotamia, Greece and Rome. The Kadesh Agreement, after the Battle of Kadesh in
1274 between the Hittites and Ancient Egyptians, is the first written interaction between two states, produced as a result of developing international diplomacy.
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Diplomatic Asylum
According to the UNHCR, the term "diplomatic asylum" in the broad sense is used to denote asylum granted by a State outside its territory, particularly in its diplomatic missions (diplomatic asylum in the strict sense), in its consulates, on board its ships in the territorial waters of another State (naval asylum), and also on board its aircraft and of its military or para-military installations in foreign territory. The other form of asylum granted to individuals, namely, that which is granted by the State within its borders, is generally given the name "territorial asylum".
Inviolability
It means the ensuring the safety and standards of rights for diplomats in particular for this agenda item. According to the French Foreign Ministry, “Diplomatic agents, the administrative and technical staff of an Embassy, as well as their families, enjoy full diplomatic privileges and immunities. They are thus not liable to arrest or detention.”
Ad Hoc Diplomacy
Ad hoc diplomacy is the oldest form of diplomacy. As the United Nations Secretariat explained in 1963:
“The custom of sending a special envoy on mission from one State to another, in order to mark the dignity or importance of a particular occasion, is probably the oldest of all means by which diplomatic relations may be conducted. It was only with the emergence of national States on a modern pattern that permanently accredited diplomatic missions, entrusted with a full range of powers, came to take the place of temporary ambassadors sent specially from one sovereign to another. However, although the legal rules which were evolved to determine diplomatic relations between States were therefore based largely on the conduct of permanent missions, so that special missions came to seem merely a particular variant of the other, the sending of special missions was never discontinued. During the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries such missions were
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frequently dispatched in order to provide suitable State representation at major ceremonial occasions, such as coronations or royal weddings, or for the purposes of important political negotiations, particularly those held at international congresses.”
( Yearbook of the International Law Commission 1963 , vol. II, p. 151, para. 3)
Envoy
Envoy refers to a messenger of a diplomatic mission. Envoys can be on the organizational and national level. For example, the United Nations Envoy to Syria,
Staffan de Mistura, specializes in the conflict in Syria. He is considered to be the highest
UN representative reporting to the UN on Syria.
Diplomatic Immunity
According to the Encyclopaedia Brittanica, diplomatic immunity, in international law, the immunities enjoyed by foreign states or international organizations and their official representatives from the jurisdiction of the country in which they are present.
History of International Relations and Diplomacy
Personal inviolability of diplomats was in relation with their envoys in Greek city states and ancient settlements of the civilization of the Indus Valley. The sacredness of the representative of the state, however, “became of less importance with the rise of the
Roman Empire and later of Byzantium – both of these intent of subjugation rather than co-existence. Diplomacy in the modern sense revived with the Renaissance and during the sixteenth century
– a period of violent religious strife – the special protection and immunity from criminal jurisdiction even for ambassadors” (Denza) was created. The
Congress of Westphalia which ended the Thirty Years War of Germany in 1648 had a special emphasis on diplomatic relations among German confederations that were ought to be established. “Permanent legations were accepted as the normal way of conducting international business among sovereign States, and over the next century detailed rules emerged in relation to the immunity of ambassadors and their
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accompanying families and staff from civil as well as criminal proceedings, the inviolability of their embassy premises and their exemption from customs duties and from taxes.” (Denza)
Early writers of international diplomacy, Grotius (1625), Bynkershoek (1721) and
Vattel (1758) produced works that aimed to establish frameworks for diplomatic relations. In 1713, the Peace of Utrecht set a framework of international relations that determined the status quo in mainland Europe for the century.
European Ambassadors present at the Congress of Vienna
Congress of Vienna
In 1815, the Congress of Vienna was initiated to decide upon the faith of European relations after the coalition against Napoleon Bonaparte of France triumphed. Because the equilibrium of powers had been reset as a result of conflict that spread all around the continent, the major powers wanted to reform the Utrecht standards in the Congress of Vienna. Some of the matters that were set to settle “the rights of German Jews, the abolition of the slave trade and navigation on European rivers, not to mention the restoration of the Bourbon royal family in France, Spain and Naples, the constitution of
Switzerland, issues of diplomatic precedence and, last but not least, the foundation of a new Germa n confederation to replace the defunct Holy Roman Empire.” (Ghervas)
Siege of the International Legations
The famous Siege of the International Legations took place in Beijing, which was then the capital of the Qing Dynasty. The Boxer rebellion was an anti-foreigner uprising due to the painful history of the nation with the British Empire. The opposition to imperial expansion associated the imperialistic movement with Christian missionaries, and that created the Eight-Nation Alliance, which intervened to the conflict in the region. The
Eight Nation alliance consisted of United Kingdom, Russia, Japan, France, United
States, Germany, Italy, and Austro-Hungarian Empire. The siege took place in the
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summer of 1900, when more than 3.000 Chinese-Christians refuged in the Beijing
Legation Quarter. This battle resulted in the death of hundreds of diplomats and refugees, thus international law lacked the strength to protect asylum-seekers at the time.
Vienna Convention
The Vienna Convention was signed on 18 April 1961. It consists of 53 articles and “ As of April 2014, there are 190 state parties to the convention
[1]
including all UN member states except Antigua and Barbuda, Republic of Palau, Solomon
Islands, South Sudan and Republic of Vanuatu, as well as UN observer states Holy
See and State of Palestine .” According to Eileen Denza of the Audovisual Library of
International Law (UN), “Until it was accepted,... there could be no peaceful international relations or rules on questions of substance …The preparatory work for the Vienna
Conference followed the standard United Nations procedure for the codification of international law – applied in fields where there is already extensive State practice, precedent and doctrine.” The ideas behind the convention were set in the Sixth
Committee of the United Nations General Assembly with the support of the Yugoslavian delegation in 1952. The proposition by Yugoslavia was for “the General Assembly requested the International Law Commission to undertake as a priority topic codification of the law of diplomatic intercourse and immunities.”
New York Convention on Special Missions
The Convention, which was signed in 1969 and put into force in 1985, was adopted by the United Nations General Assembly. “The Convention on Special Missions is the applicable international law as between the parties thereto. Yet it is not clear how it is applied in practice even between the parties. In any event, the parties are relatively few, and there are few other treaties on the subject. So, as between most States, and in most circumstances, the governing rules on special missions and other official visitors are to be found in customary international law.” (Wood)
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United States of America
The USA has established diplomatic relations with almost all countries since its foundation. However, as a key contributor to international affairs, it has often faced many hostilities from international groups and individuals. The attacks on US
Embassies in Iran, Vietnam, Kenya and Tanzania have been the deadliest. However, more than 30 US embassies have faced attacks in the previous fifty years.
Wikileaks and National Security Agency (NSA)
The USA has also affected diplomatic inviolability in a different manner. With the
WikiLeaks documents published online and the security leakages of the National
Security Agency (NSA), the USA has been accused of violating the international legislations on diplomatic inviolability. Edward Snowden, who is one of the individuals on CIA’s top wanted list is known for the connection with the NSA leakage. Snowden now resides in Russia. Julian Assange, who is an Australian computer programmer and journalist, now resides in the Ecuador Embassy in London.
UN General Assembly Sixth Committee (Legal)
The General Assembly consists of six functioning sub bodies, and the Legal
Committee meets annually since 1945. The mandate of the committee is:
The UN General Assembly has an express mandate to promote the progressive development of public international law. Article 13 of the UN Charter establishes, in particular, that the “General Assembly shall initiate studies and make recommendations for the purpose of: (…) encouraging the progressive development of international law and its codification. Subsequent practice has interpreted this provision as a broad authorization to elaborate new treaties on the widest range of issues, to adopt them, and to recommend them to states for their subsequent signature, ratification and accession. While international lawmaking negotiations take place in a variety of specialized bodies of the United
Nations, depending on their actual subject-matter, those negotiations related to general international law are usually held at the Sixth Committee.
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The fundamental basis of the committee is the Vienna Convention of 1961. Ensuring the inviolability of diplomats is an agenda item often discussed in this forum.
1864
1900
1961
1965
1969
1972
1981
1998
2003
2004
1648
1708
1815
1829
Congress of Westphalia
British Diplomatic Privileges Act
Congress of Vienna
First attack ever on a diplomatic mission. Russian Embassy in Tehran is attacked, one person is killed.
First Geneva Convention
Siege of the International Legations
Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations
Saigon Embassy Attack
New York Convention on Special Missions
Bloody Sunday, UK Embassy in Dublin, Ireland
Iraqi Embassy Bombing in Beirut, Lebanon
US Embassy Bombing in Nairobi, Kenya
Attack on UK Embassy in Istanbul, Turkey
United Nations Convention on Jurisdictional Immunities of
States and Their Property
Resolutions 36/33, 37/108, 38/136, 39/83, 40/73, 41/78, 42/154, 43/167, 45/39,
47/31, 49/49, 51/156, 53/97, 55/149, 57/15, 59/37 and 61/31 of the United Nations
General Assembly are the official documentation of the proposals. However, the most efficient work was produced in 1961 as referred before, the Vienna Convention. Only 22 states had ratified the convention by 1964, yet its efficiency increased as acts of terror on diplomatic missions became on the rise. As of today, there are 190 signatories, and
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all have ratified the convention.
The fundamental ideas behind the convention came into effect in the 1980s,
“from those alarmed at the opportunities it provided for abuse – as demonstrated in particular when following the murder of a policewoman by shooting from the premises of the Libyan diplomatic mission in London the United Kingdom broke diplomatic relations and all those within the mission left England under the shield of immunity … The focus of public concern has instead shifted to the vulnerability of diplomats to terrorist attacks.” The illegal kidnapping of embassy personnel for ransom was often driven by radical ideologies. These acts of blackmailing were not only limited to kidnapping.
Terrorism also emerged in forms of besieging and the bombing of embassies. The
United States, after the dreadful attacks of 1998 on the embassies in Kenya and
Tanzania, increased security precautions and raised measures to fight international terrorism.
However, the case of United States Embassy officials in Tehran showed a loophole in international diplomacy for the protection of embassy personnel. “For the most part, parties to the Convention are in no way complicit in these attacks and have done their best to provide protection
– sometimes helped by wealthier sending States.
The striking exception was the detention for over a year of the hostages in the United
Sta tes Embassy in Tehran.” (Denza). The United States of America took the case to the
International Court of Justice. The Court’s judgment was in favor of the United States, however Iran did not agree with the jurisdiction of the Court and did not ratify it. Yet, the
United States regained the support of the international community and secured the release of hostages in Algeria in a similar situation years later.
Another case that has been brought up to the International Court upheld a counter-claim by Uganda was against Congo, “that Congolese soldiers had occupied the Ugandan diplomatic mission in Kinshasa and violated article 29 of the Convention by threatening and maltreating staff on the premises.”
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Member states have applied the Vienna Convention in several hundred cases internally, as the file puts a clear emphasis on the protection of diplomats within the national courts of a country. In national courts there have been hundreds of cases where the Vienna Convention has been applied, since many of its most frequently invoked provisions concern whether a national court may assume jurisdiction over civil or criminal proceedings and what evidence may be admissible in national proceedings.
“Most of these cases concern ambiguities in the text on such questions as the true meaning of the exceptions to immunity from civil jurisdiction, the construction of the term
“permanent resident”, the protection of an embassy’s bank account from enforcement proceedings, or the balance to be struck between protecting the dignity of embassy premises and permitting effective exercise of human rights to demonstrate and to speak freely.” (Denza)
• Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations Original Text http://www.mfa.gov.tr/data/Kutuphane/MultilateralConventions/ViennaConvention onDiplomaticRelations.pdf
• New York Convention on Special Missions Original Text http://legal.un.org/ilc/texts/instruments/english/conventions/9_3_1969.pdf
•
Diplomatic and Consular Immunity http://www.state.gov/documents/organization/150546.pdf
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Convention on Special Missions . New York: United Nations Office of Public Information,
1970. United Nations . UN General Assembly, 2005. Web. 27 Jan. 2016.
Denza, Eileen. "Inviolability of the Mission Premises." Oxford Public International Law .
Oxford Public International Law, 20 Mar. 2008. Web. 21 Jan. 2016.
Denza, Eileen. "United Nations Audiovisual Library of International Law." United Nations
Audiovisual Library of International Law . United Nations, n.d. Web. 21 Jan. 2016.
"EU Presidency Statement
– Protection, Security and Safety of Diplomatic and Consular
Missions and Representatives." EU@UN . European Union, 18 Dec. 2006. Web.
18 Jan. 2016.
Frey, Marsha L. "Diplomatic Immunity | International Law." Encyclopedia Britannica
Online . Encyclopedia Britannica, n.d. Web. 25 Jan. 2016.
Ghervas, Stella. "The Congress of Vienna: A Peace for the Strong." HistoryToday .
HistoryToday, 9 Sept. 2014. Web. 23 Jan. 2016.
"Inviolability." France Diplomatie . French Foreign Ministry, n.d. Web. 11 Jan. 2016.
J. Brown, “Diplomatic Immunity: State Practice under the Vienna Convention on
Diplomatic Relations”, International and Comparative Law Quarterly , vol. 37,
1988, p. 53.
Wood, Michael, Sir. "Convention on Special Missions - Main Page." Convention on
Special Missions - Main Page . United Nations, n.d. Web. 21 Jan. 2016.
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