The Press and Journal (Inverness, Highlands, and Islands)
| George Mitchell
Embassies, or diplomatic missions as they are officially known, are unique setups. A building or set of buildings staffed with your own people, situated in a foreign country, their purpose being to represent the sending state in the receiving state. Most importantly and fascinating for me, is that they are sovereign territory. For example, once inside 24 Grosvenor Square in London, you are not in the UK anymore, you are on American soil. Likewise, inside Smolenskaya Naberezhnaya 10 in Moscow, you are no longer on Russian territory, you are on British territory. No one, absolutely no one from the host country, for any reason whatsoever, can enter a diplomatic mission without permission from the country in question. Not even to put out a fire.
Embassies can be the grandest buildings in the world, or the most modest. The bigger the sending and receiving state, the more lavish the setup. The smaller the sending and receiving state, then it’s all much more low key. I’ve spent numerous hours wandering the side streets of city centres playing “spot the embassy”. In the centre of Budapest, the importantlooking UK embassy stands tall and proud. A 30-minute walk away, behind a small gate right next door to a restaurant, is the tiny, inconspicuous embassy of an African republic.
In Berlin, the US embassy is right up next to the Brandenburg Gate, which must be one of the most prestigious addresses in the world. Our embassy is just round the corner. The Russian embassy is also nearby on Unter Der Linden. Of course, this was once the USSR embassy in what was West Germany with the Berlin Wall just dozens of metres away. This little corner of Berlin really must have been spy central.
Many western embassies during the Cold War years were hot spots for wannabe defectors, for once inside these grounds, you were then on say Swiss or Swedish or UK soil and safe. Therefore, the streets outside them were well guarded by the host country, who did all they could to stop their own citizens making a break for it.
There are numerous examples of people taking refuge in an embassy, but the most famous episode happened in 1956. As the Soviets were poised to crush all political dissent in Hungary, Cardinal Jozsef Mindszenty, who had only just been released from eight years in jail for speaking out against the communists, entered the American Embassy and claimed political asylum. There was uproar from Moscow, but it was hoped that the Soviets would allow the cardinal safe passage to the west. To be fair, they did... but not until after a Vatican and US deal was brokered in 1971. By then, Mindszenty had been holed up inside the US embassy for an astonishing 15 years.
A more modern example is the Julian Assange case. Many in the UK and around the world, including those in power, have complained. They say Assange should be handed over and put on trial. It’s costing money and embarrassing they say. Sorry, but we cannot have one rule for some and one for another.
Irrespective of what Assange has done or has not done, he is inside a diplomatic compound with full backing of that country and no-one should be allowed to touch him. Inside the walls of that compound, it is not British territory, it is the sovereign territory of Ecuador and should remain so. End of. For if we break that rule, then no diplomatic building or bag anywhere in the world will be safe, including our own. I dread to think if we were ever to relax these rules or say give the host country a right to enter any embassy under
“special circumstances”. I can just imagine local police walking into the British embassy in the Middle East somewhere under a new trumped-up “terrorism law”. No, definitely the laws on diplomatic missions must stay as they are, for all our sakes.
We’ve had diplomatic relations with numerous countries for decades, some hundreds of years, but many only in the past few years. For example, we only recently re-opened channels with Iran, and in 2007 we opened our first diplomatic mission with North Korea.
In turn, they opened their first embassy in London. Unlike numerous other countries, with fancy pants addresses in the heart of the capital, grandiose buildings surrounded by high walls, the North Korea embassy is housed in what once was, well, a house. At the end of a typical suburban street, right in among ordinary family homes, sits the North Korean embassy with its flag fluttering in the garden. I’ve twice tried to get a visa for North Korea but wasn’t successful, so it’s just dawned on me, all I need to do is get to London and jump over the fence of that house, then technically I’m on North Korean soil. Whilst that may be true, I am of course joking. Never ever mess around in the vicinity of diplomatic missions, there are often host police on the outside, and guards or police of the sending country just over the fence. You never want to cause a diplomatic incident, not a clever thing to do.
If you’re travelling off the tourist route, then it’s vital to not only know where the nearest British embassy is, but to make sure you have its phone number for emergencies. If you do find yourself in a less than democratic country and are arrested, insist on calling your embassy straight away. If you’re in danger in any way whatsoever, go to your embassy and take your passport with you. There may well be a policeman from the host country standing outside, so stay calm and tell him you have an appointment in your embassy. Unless you raise his suspicions, he cannot stop you from entering without a very good reason.
Countries I’ve been in that do not have diplomatic relations with the UK include Transnistria, Nagorno Karabakh and Kyrgyzstan. You really are on your own there.
Harrowing footage can be viewed online of North Korean refugees who have managed to get themselves out of that despotic country, trying in vain to get into the South Korean embassy in Beijing. Desperately they try to make the final run to freedom, but are pulled back by Chinese police. North Koreans who are caught this way are sent back to North Korea, often to a terrible fate.
The first British embassy I ever entered was in China in 1994. I got some inoculations from the doctor before heading down to South East Asia. This being in the days before the internet and international mobiles, I remember picking up a week’s old copy of The Times from the embassy reception. I devoured that paper from back to front for four entire days.
I’m suddenly reminded of a story about the old British embassy in Moscow. An elegant 19th-century mansion house, bought by the British in 1927, it faces the Kremlin on the opposite side of the river. I have no idea if this is true, but here’s the story. When Stalin drew back his curtains each morning, the first thing he saw was the British flag, fluttering inside the compound of the British embassy just across the river. That sight made him extremely angry and numerous attempts were made over the years to purchase the building from the British, but we always refused.
A new, much-needed state-of-the-art embassy was finally built in 2002, and this is where I picked up my second UK passport. Oh, I’ve just remembered, in the 2010 general election, I also cast my vote inside that embassy. It’s true; about three weeks before the election, I walked in with my passport, was given a voting slip for the Gordon constituency, went into a booth and cast my vote. It felt rather exciting. Goodness, I’d totally forgotten about that.
Thankfully, our grand old original embassy beside the Kremlin is still British territory. We kept the building, it’s now the official residence of the British Ambassador.
Diplomatic missions, embassies, call them what you may, they are unique little pockets of sovereign territory placed all over the world. In London alone there are roughly 165 little pockets of “foreign” land inside the capital that neither we, nor our police, armed forces, our PM or even the Queen can enter without that country’s specific permission.
Absolutely fascinating things, embassies.