Immunity not impunity.

To protect the common people from abuse, the exercise of power must be accompanied by checks and balances. Yet in order to be effective, these checks and balances themselves must be invested with a form of power or privilege, which in turn can be subject to misuse. It is a delicate balance, no pun intended, and requires a willingness to look into changing contexts and the needs of the most vulnerable.

One of these privileges that emerged to check the abuse of power is diplomatic immunity. In the ancient world, where relations between neighbors were more often than not bloody and characterized by violence, lasting peace only became possible when communication between nations was institutionalized - and this only happened when it became accepted practice to protect the heralds or emissaries of other nations. Before then, with foreigners seldom having any rights in a nation other than their own, it was relatively common to execute any messengers, particularly the bearers of bad news.

Over time, nations developed the practice of sending religious figures as emissaries, and later the idea of the inviolability of the persons of official envoys or ambassadors (religious or not) became ingrained and codified practice, even during times of war between nations. In this way, avenues of communication were to be guaranteed even between nations at war, all the better to secure an eventual peace.

It is for these laudable reasons - as a check on the absolute power of the host country over a foreign envoy - that the rules behind diplomatic privileges were developed. This includes the rules on diplomatic immunity, in which foreign diplomats are deemed immune from suit in their host countries. Yet such a blanket protection leaves itself open to abuse, and there have been many instances around the world where such immunities have allegedly been abused.

In many of these cases, the accuser leaves unsatisfied, but I'd like to call notice to a recent case decided in the United Kingdom - granting justice to an abused Filipina domestic worker - which hopefully shows how such immunities cannot and should not be used as a shield to injustice, such as the practice of modern day slavery.

The case (Basfar (Respondent) v Wong (Appellant) [2022] UKSC 20) involved a domestic worker who had been employed by the household of a Saudi Arabian diplomat, who brought her with them upon assignment to the United Kingdom. After escaping from the household, she filed a civil claim...