Essay On Diplomatic Asylum

Latin American states have traditionally allocated a more significant position to diplomatic asylum than that existing in other regions of the world. However, even in this area, the existence of a rule of customary law allowing for shelter on mission premises, has been doubted.66 Jeffery for instance expressed the view that opinion juris as a required element of customary law is missing, and bases this view on the ICJ judgment in the Asylum Case.

There are three most relevant agreements on diplomatic asylum in Latin and Central America. First, the Havana Convention on Political Asylum (1928) pro-claims that States have to respect the asylum granted to political offenders in diplomatic missions to the extent it is allowed, as a right or through

The Court emphasized that diplomatic asylum is not, in principle, an opposition to the operation of justice. But this happens if, in the guise of justice, arbitrary action is substituted for the rule of law. more precisely. if the administration of justice were corrupted by measures clearly prompted by political aims. Diplomatic asylum protects the political offender against any measures of a manifestly extra-legal character which a government might take against its political opponents.

The fact bears observing that even within the Latin American institution of diplomatic asylum, reasons of humanity are, by themselves, not sufficient to establish a right to give refuge on mission premises. The significant feature of diplomatic asylum, as it appears in the relevant treaties, is that the persons seeking asylum are accused of political offenses or pursued for political reasons.93 If humanitarian reasons had been the decisive factor, diplomatic asylum would have been opened to those accused of common offences as well even the common criminal might, after all, be threatened with mob