Draft Optional Protocol One on the Status of the Courier and the Bag of Special Missions [*]
Date enacted: 1989-07-20
In force: -
The States Parties to the present Protocol and to the articles on the status of the diplomatic courier and the diplomatic bag not accompanied by diplomatic courier, hereinafter referred to as “the articles”,
Have agreed as follows:
Article I
The articles also apply to a courier and a bag employed for the official communications of a State with its special missions within the meaning of the Convention on Special Missions of 8 December 1969, wherever situated, and for the official communications of those missions with the sending State or with its other missions, consular posts or delegations.
Article II
For the purposes of the articles:
| a. |
“mission” also means a special mission within the meaning of the Convention on Special Missions of 8 December 1969; |
| b. |
“diplomatic courier” also means a person duly authorized by the sending State as a courier of a special mission within the meaning of the Convention on Special Missions of 8 December 1969 who is entrusted with the custody, transportation and delivery of a diplomatic bag and is employed for the official communications referred to in article I of the present Protocol; |
| c. |
“diplomatic bag” also means the packages containing official correspondence, and documents or articles intended exclusively for official use, whether accompanied by a courier or not, which are used for the official communications referred to in article I of the present Protocol and which bear visible external marks of their character as a bag of a special mission within the meaning of the Convention on Special Missions of 8 December 1969. |
Article III
| 1. |
The present Protocol shall, as between Parties to it and to the Convention on Special Missions of 8 December 1969, supplement the rules on the status of the diplomatic courier and the diplomatic bag contained in that Convention. |
| 2. |
The provisions of the present Protocol are without prejudice to other international agreements in force as between parties to them. |
| 3. |
Nothing in the present Protocol shall preclude the Parties thereto from concluding international agreements relating to the status of the diplomatic courier and the diplomatic bag not accompanied by diplomatic courier, provided that such new agreements are not incompatible with the object and purpose of the articles and do not affect the enjoyment by the other Parties to the articles of their rights or the performance of their obligations under the articles. |
| [*] |
No instruments have been concluded under the auspices of the United Nations on the basis these Draft Articles. See General Assembly decision 50/416 of 1995-12-11. |