Diplomatic Immunity !

 Diplomatic Immunity is a courtesy nations extend to one another as a protection from arrest for their diplomats when relations between the nations concerned become tense. This was clearly illustrated back in December, 1941 when Japan launched a surprise bombing attack on the American Pacific fleet at Pearl Harbour in Hawaii.

That led to a declaration of war, but the Japanese diplomats in Japanese embassies in American cities were allowed to leave and travel to neutral countries from where they returned unharmed to Japan..  Similarly, the Americans in their Tokyo embassy received a similar courtesy and returned home unharmed.

Unfortunately, this privilege is often abused.  The vast number of representatives who gather at the United Nations in New York are notorious for not paying parking and other traffic fines because they hide behind the protection of their diplomatic immunity.  They know they can not be arrested and put before a court and so their simply ignore American road rules.

Over time, diplomatic immunity has extended from diplomats to many ranks of military and civil personnel and their families who represent the American government abroad. A road accident in Britain is straining relations between America and Britain because diplomatic immunity is shielding one of the parties involved in an accident  from the reach of British law.

In 2019 there was a collision between a car and a motorcyclist on a public road outside RAF base Broughton in which 19 year old Harry Dunn was killed.  The car was driven by a 42 year old American woman, wife of an American officer serving at the base. Both she and her husband were covered by diplomatic immunity.

She immediately boarded a flight home to America and has refused to return to Britain to attend the inquest into the cause of that death.  The American government has refused to intervene and waive that diplomatic immunity and the injustice involved is straining relations between the two countries.

The whole point of diplomatic immunity was to shield people send abroad on their country's behalf from spurious charges and imprisonment by regimes that oppress their citizens.  In this instance it is viewed as stopping the apportioning of blame for who was responsible for that road accident from being decided in a law court.

Should this American woman return and be found the guilty party, diplomatic immunity might shield her from a prison sentence, or even a fine, but the fact that she has used it to stifle an accident investigation between two countries that have friendly relations is a gross distortion of the rules that apply.

Friendly nations need to urgently revise the rules that apply to diplomatic relations and where they will apply.  It is simply unacceptable that the proper investigation of a death can be avoided by a blanket cover that avoids all responsibility because the person involved holds a diplomatic passport.

Justice demands that diplomatic immunity has limitations  !