12
may employ all appropriate means, including diplomatic or consular couriers, diplomatic or consular bags and messages in code or cipher, However, the consular post may install and use a wireless transmitter only with the consent of the receiving State.
2. The official correspondence of the consular post shall be in- violable. Official correspondence means all correspondence relating to the consular post and its functions.
3. The consular bag shall be neither opened nor detained. Never- theless, if the competent authorities of the receiving State have serious reason to believe that the bag contains something other than the cor- respondence, documents or articles referred to in paragraph 4 of this Article. They may request that the bag be opened in their presence by an authorized representative of the sending State. If this request is refused by the authorities of the sending State, the bag shall be returned to in place of origin.
The packages constituting the consular bag shall bear visible external marks of their character and may contain only official cortes. pondence and documents or articles intended exclusively for official use.
S The consular courier shall be provided with an official document indicating bịp status and the number of packages constituting the consular bag Except with the consent of the receiving State he shall be neither a national of the receiving State, nor, unless he is a national of the sending State, a permanent resident of the receiving State. In the performance of his functions he shall be protected by the receiving Slate. He shal enjoy personal inviolability and shall not be liable to any form of arrest or detention.
6. The sending State, its diplomatic missions and its consular posts may designate consular couriers ad hoc. In such cases the provisiona of paragraph 5 of this Article shall also apply except that the immunities therein mentioned shall cease to apply when such a courier has delivered to the consignee the consular bag in his charge.
7. A consular bag may be entrusted to the captain of a ship or of a commercial aircraft scheduled to lend at an authorized port of entry. He shall be provided with an official document indicating the number of packages constituting the bag, but he shall not be considered to be a consular courier. By arrangement with the appropriate local authorities. the consular post may send one of its members to take possession of the bag directly and freely from the captain of the ship or of the aircraft.
ARTICLE 39.
Consular fees and charges.
1. The consular post may levy in the territory of the receiving State the fees and charges provided by the laws and regulations of the sending State for consular acis.
2.
The sums collected in the form of the fees and charges referred to in paragraph I of this Article, and the receipts for such fees and charges, shall be exempt from all dues and taxes in the receiving State.
13
SECTION 11-FACILITIES, PRIVILEGES AND IMMUNMES RELATING TO CAREER CONSULAR OFFICERS AND OTHER MEMBERS OF A Consular POST.
1.
ARTICLE 41.
Personal Inviolability of consular officers.
Consular officers shall not be liable to arrest or detention pending trial, except in the case of a grave crime and pursuant to a decision by the competent judicial authority,
Except in the case specified in paragraph 1 of this Article, consular officers shall not be committed to prison or liable to any other form of restriction on their personal freedom save in execution of a judicial decision of final effect.
ARTICLE 43,
Inmunity from jurisdiction.
1. Consular officers and consular employees shall not be amenable 10 the jurisdiction of the judicial or administrative authorities of the receiving Stale in respect of acts performed in the exercise of consular Functiona
2. The provisions of paragraph 1 of this Article shall not, however, apply in respect of a civil action either:
(a) arising out of a contract concluded by a consular officer or s consular employee in which he did not contract expressly or impliedly as an agent of the sending State; or
(8) by a third party for damage arising from an accident in the
receiving State caused by a vehicle, vessel or aircraft.
ARTICLE 44.
Liability to give evidence.
Members of a consulat post may be called upon to attend as witnesses in the course of judicial or administrative proceedings. A coD- ular employee or a member of the service staff shall not, except in the casca mentioned in paragraph 3 of this Article, decline to give evidence. If a consular officer should decline to do so, na coercive measure or penalty may be applied to him.
2. The authority requiring the evidence of a consular officer shall avoid interference with the performance of bis functions. It may, when possible, take auch evidence at his residence or at the consular post or accept a statement from him in writing.
3. Members of a consular post are under no obligation to give evidence concerning matters connected with the exercise of their functions or to produce official correspondence and documents relating thereto. They are also entitled to decline to give evidence as expert witnesses with regard to the law of the sending State.