November 15-2013
A nasty diplomatic tussle between Iran and Saudi Arabia finally ended last week after 7 1/2 months when Iran allowed a drunken Saudi diplomat to leave Tehran after he paid blood money to the family of the man he killed in a car crash.
Despite the lessons of the 1979-81 hostage episode, the Islamic Republic effectively held the Saudi diplomat hostage by refusing to allow him to leave Iran. He was apparently confined to the Saudi embassy for 7 1/2 months under threat of arrest by Iran if he left the building.
Saudi Arabia offered to pay blood money to the victim’s family months ago. It wasn’t known how much was finally paid.
But no one claimed the issue was the amount of blood money. Rather the problem centered on the demands of many hardliners in the Majlis that the diplomat be tried in an Iranian court, which would have been another gross violation of international law.
News reports had said the family also demanded that the diplomat face trial in Iran. But the Iranian Students News Agency (ISNA) last week said the family had agreed to accept the blood money payment, which, under Iranian law, allowed the Judiciary to close the case, thus permitting the diplomat to leave the country.
Three decades after the US hostage episode, diplomatic immunity is still viewed as an unworthy international standard by many in the Tehran regime.
Majlis Deputy Mehdi Davatgari, a member of the National Security and Foreign Policy Committee, had been the deputy making the most noise about the case. Back in June, he said, “A case has been opened at the Judiciary in this regard, but given the [diplomatic] immunity of the Saudi diplomat, the Judiciary has reached out to the Saudi judiciary through the Foreign Ministry to drop his immunity or pursue his case on its own.”
It appears the Saudis showed no interest in those ideas and demanded that Iran adhere to the rules of diplomatic immunity and allow the diplomat to leave.
It was Davatgari who announced the end of the dispute last week.
On March 14, a drunk Saudi Embassy staffer was reported to have killed an Iranian driver and injured a passerby in a car accident in Tehran.
The chairman of the Majlis National Security and Foreign Policy Commission, Alaeddin Borujerdi, announced in April that the “drunk Saudi diplomat has been banned from leaving the country,” effectively holding the diplomat hostage.
“Those working as diplomats in Iran should obey the country’s laws and regulations irrespective of their diplomatic immunity,” Borujerdi told reporters. That is true in every country, but no country has the authority to detain a diplomat for any cause, even for murder. The Islamic Republic has objected very loudly on several occasions when Iranian diplomats have been detained by police abroad for law violations until their immunity was established.
Davatgari earlier named the drunken Saudi diplomat as Yasser bin Mohammad Ali Yami, who was assigned to the Saudi consular section in Tehran in January 2011.
Davatgari said the diplomat was driving a vehicle with diplomatic plates more than 130 kilometers per hour (81 mph) in northern Tehran before ramming into a Pride passenger car, which was slowing down to stop. He said the Pride jumped nearly 60 meters on impact.
Davatgari said the level of the alcohol in the Saudi diplomat’s blood was 2.87 percent, according to the tests conducted at the Imam Hussein Hospital three hours after the accident. All US states, Canadian provinces and European countries consider a blood alcohol content in excess of 0.08 percent to be impaired driving. However, Davatgari’s figure of 2.87 percent appeared questionable. Any alcohol level exceeding 0.5 percent is considered to risk death. At almost six times that level, the Saudi diplomat would have been pickled.
Davatgari also said the diplomatic vehicle’s insurance had expired. News reports at the time of the crash said four bottles of alcohol were found in the diplomat’s car.
In April, Deputy Foreign Minister for Arab and Africa Affairs Hossain Amir Abdollahian said, “The issue is being pursued in a diplomatic path. We will not let some people abuse their diplomatic immunity and endanger the lives and rights of our citizens.”
While many in the Islamic Republic’s establishment frown on immunity for foreign diplomats, Iran has never been shy about claming it for its own diplomats. Last year, an Iranian diplomat in Brazil was caught fondling children in a public pool in Brazil. Iran immediately invoked diplomatic immunity and removed the man from the country, claiming that the charges against him were the result of differing cultural standards. Months later, news reports said the diplomat had been fired, but not tried for any offense.
