Diplomatic immunity may be intended to keep diplomats from running afoul of local authorities while serving abroad , but some workers take it as a license to act like jerks . While the Vienna Conventions on International Relations of 1961 abstract a serial of safeguards that protect diplomats from being unfairly penalize should irritability flare between their country and their host nations , more than a few diplomats have taken advantage of their privileges in an irritating way . Here are just a few teasing little liberties diplomat have taken .
1. PARK WHEREVER YOU WANT
The most common manifestation of this unconsidered conduct call for diplomats ' parking . Just expect New Yorkers ; diplomat at the United Nations apparently view Manhattan as their secret parking lot . Back in 1996 , diplomats racked up 143,508 parking process , which would have be them $ 15.8 million if not for diplomatical immunity . Russia alone was responsible for 32,000 of those fines .
2. OR CLEAR A SPOT FOR YOURSELF
A few hundred thousand amateur tickets seem like downright responsible behavior when compare to former Afghanistani diplomat Shah Mohammad Dost ’s caper behind the cycle . In 1987 , Dost was accused of intentionally running a woman over so as to get a parking daub during a slip to an air conditioner store in Queens . allot to the dupe , her boyfriend was backing into the spot when Dost rolled up and demanded they cede the space to him because he was an Afghan diplomatist . When they refused , Dost threw his Lincoln into train and execute the fair sex over , beam her to the infirmary .
3. BECOME A DOGGIE DIPLOMAT
Here ’s a caseful where diplomatic immunity did n’t work out quite as well as a diplomatist had hoped . In 1975 , a UN delegate from Barbados claim that diplomatical immunity go to his pooch , who had bitten several multitude . The delegate monish police military officer of " potential outside consequences " if they sample to contain the strong-growing German sheepherder . Nice endeavor , but Fido ’s not exactly negotiate trade treaties .
A Mexican diplomat got the same ill-bred awakening in 1984 . Military attaché Enrique Flores was keeping a pack of 10 basset hound hounds at his Virginia menage in violation of local zoning laws . Even though the natural law state that Flores could only have four hounds at once , he appeal to the State Department for diplomatic immunity . The State Department turn over him down . imagine they ’re qat multitude .
4. LOSE YOUR IMMUNITY IN THE DIVORCE
In 1989 , Mozambique ’s voice to the United Nations wanted to dissociate his American wife , so he waived his diplomatic exemption to take the thing to court . alas for the diplomat , Antonio Fernandez , he did n’t fare well in the subject ; he ended up losing the couple ’s $ 5 million estate of the realm in the decision . Whoops .
Fernandez did n’t suffer from any shortage of gall , though . After losing the decision he attempted to invoke his diplomatical immunity privileges to keep from paying his x - married woman . Fernandez take his case all the direction to the Supreme Court , but in the close his former love develop the couple ’s Greenwich , Connecticut , landed estate .
5. LIGHT UP ON A PLANE
In 2010 , a Katari diplomatist ran into problem on a Washington - to - Denver escape when he decide to have a smoke in the plane ’s lavatory . To make things bad , Mohammed Al - Madadi also made a joke that some passengers and flight personnel perceive to be a terrorist threat . Air United States Marshals Service sounded various alarms , and in the end two F-16 fighter jets escort the flight to its last destination . While diplomatical immunity kept Al - Madadi from being charged with any offense , the Katari government sent him home to facilitate smooth things over .
6. STOP CUTTING YOUR LAWN
The residents of New Rochelle , New York , found themselves with a usual problem in 2008 : one house in the residential area had become a real eyesore . It sit around vacant for long time as weeds take over the pace , the rouge start peeling , and the attribute slip into an ugly res publica of decay . New Rochelle had a problem , though : the dilapidated house had a kind of diplomatical immunity that protect it from local ordinance . Somalia owned the menage , which it at times used to house United Nations diplomat . Since the vacant house was nontaxable from taxes , the townspeople could n’t use spleen or other penalties to force the Somalians to do a small landscaping . The lesson here : if you want to stop mowing your lawn , join the Foreign Service .
7. STOP PAYING YOUR RENT
A word of advice to landlord out there : if diplomats desire to rent one of your property , you might want to get a powerful security deposit . Just ask some of Manhattan ’s biggest landlords . A 1996New York Timesstory illustrated the difficulty of lease to diplomats ; landlord really do n’t have any sound mechanism through which they can collect derelict rent or evict diplomatic tenants . At the sentence the article was written , one West African country was over $ 20,000 behind in its rent check for a pair of sumptuousness apartments in midtown Manhattan .
If you or I draw out a stunt like that , we ’d be out on the streets . But diplomat enjoy a special kind of immunity do it as " inviolability , " which states that the secret mansion house of diplomats ca n’t be enter by the host country ’s agent without the visiting country ’s consent . In short , the only way you’re able to evict foreign diplomat is if their home nation gives you the thumb - up first .
8. SLAUGHTER A SHEEP
Diplomatic behaviour is not , patently , a prerequisite for becoming a diplomatist . In 1984 , six Iranian diplomat make a stink in London by shoot a sheep from a business firm and cutting its throat in the street . The ritual public slaughter of an animate being is more often than not frown upon , but since the men had diplomatic granting immunity the British authorities were powerless to shoot down them with violate animal inhuman treatment laws .
9. GIVE ILLEGAL SMUGGLING A TRY
He should have just make up that checked baggage fee . In March , a North Korean diplomatist to Bangladesh was detained when he refuse to let customs officials skim his carry - on at Dhaka ’s airport . After more than four hours of reason that his diplomatical resistance protected him from give to submit to protection covering , the diplomat finally assented – at which spot , officials discovered approximately $ 1.4 million worth of illegal atomic number 79 obscure in his bagful . Though charge were never brought against the envoy to North Korea – which , due to financial sanctions , is curb in its ability to transport money internationally – he was reportedly sent back home by his political boss , ambassador Ri Song - hyon .
