By Bae Ji-sook
Staff Reporter

The U.S. embassy in Korea is paying fines for traffic violations but tickets issued for vehicles belonging to other embassies remain unpaid.

Since the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations bans government confiscation of diplomatic envoys’ assets, including cars, such fines are widely regarded as non-obligatory.

More than 50 embassies have failed to pay close to 300 million in fines for traffic violations.

According to Seoul City Hall, the U.S. embassy paid 1.5 million won for 38 cases in 2007, 1 million won for 27 cases in 2008 and 608,000 won for 19 parking violations this year. “About 40,000 won is outstanding,” Rep. Lee Hae-bong of the ruling Grand National Party said Thursday during the National Assembly inspection.

The U.S. embassy says that it is its policy to abide by the rules in a host country and paying up the fines is part of its efforts.

“It is our policy to be in 100-percent compliance with all local laws and regulations in Korea, including traffic laws and regulations. If an embassy employee or a family member of that employee is found to be in violation of local laws and regulations, they are expected to pay any fines or penalties they incur as a result of that infraction,” Aaron Tarver, the spokesman at the embassy, said.

In contrast, some other embassies are apparently taking advantage of the Vienna convention and are not paying.

Rep. Lee Eun-jae of the GNP revealed that 847 speeding tickets worth 57.5 million won have been issued to diplomats’ vehicles for the past five years, with 50 million remaining uncollected. About 93 percent of the parking tickets, totaling about 220 million won since 2007, have also been unpaid.

Vehicles belonging to Russian, Kazakhstan and Chinese diplomats were slapped with 10 million won, 2.7 million and 2.4 million won, respectively for speeding, but none of them were paid.

The Russian diplomat also did not pay about 31 million won for parking violations.

A police official, who declined to be named, said, “They are making the best use of diplomatic immunity. We have called them and asked them to pay but our requests often fall on deaf ears.”

He said, “There are some who pay voluntarily, without our request, but some just don’t respond.”
Currently, Seoul City Hall is responsible for collecting fines for parking tickets and the police are in charge of speeding regulations.

They say that it is a matter of reputation, if some embassies pay fines or others don’t. Meanwhile, the Chinese embassy last year paid about 100 million in penalties for traffic congestion around its soon-to-be-built embassy building.

bjs@koreatimes.co.kr