TNAG-0745-FCO40-949-Presence-of-Warsaw-Pact-countries-in-Hong-Kong-1978 — Page 29

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CONFIDENTIAL

GNT 401/1

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Foreign and Commonwealth Office London SW1A 2AH

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6 June 1978

PROTOCOL AMENDING THE CONSULAR CONVENTION WITH POLAND

1.

In my Circular Despatch GNT 401/3 of 25 March 1977 I asked Dependent Territories to consider what statutory or other measures were required in order to give effect to the Consular Conventions with Czechoslovakia, the German Democratic Republic, Hungary and Mongolia.

2. I request that similar consideration now be given to the implementation of the Protocol signed on 16 December 1976 amending the Consular Convention with Poland. It is the intention of the British Government to ratify the Protocol during August of this year. The Convention as amended by the Protocol, will enter into force thirty days after ratification for all territories for the international relations of which the United Kingdom is responsible.

3. The principal effect of the Protocol is to increase the privileges and immunties accorded to members of the consular posts of each country so that they equate to those enjoyed by the corresponding categories of staff of their diplomatic missions. addition, the Protocol provides for an improvement in consular rights concerning the notification of arrest of nationals and access to them in detention. New provisions are also added to the Convention regulating the exercise of jurisdiction in respect of visiting ships and giving more favourable treatment to persons having a beneficial interest in estates of small value.

4.

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During the negotiation of the Protocol it was made clear that there was no intention on the part of the United Kingdom of agreeing to the establishment of a Polish consulate in any territory. Nonetheless, on the rare occasion that a member of the Polish Consulate-General in London may seek and be given permission to visit a territory in order to peform specific consular duties, he should, during the period of his stay, be accorded the privileges and immunities to which he is entitled under the revised Convention.

5. The text of the unamended Convention (Treaty Series No 75 (1971), Cmnd. 4790) and of the United Kingdom Statutory Instruments giving effect to certain of its provisions (SI Nos 1919 and 1933 (1970) and No 1238 (1971)) were attached to Circular Saving Despatch No 9/71 of 5 February 1971. I now enclose the text of the Protocol (Poland No 1 (1977), Cmnd. 6740), the draft of the Statutory Instrument to give effect to the provisions of the revised Convention on privileges and immunities and the text of Statutory Instrument No 275 of 1978 implemneting Articles XVI and XVII of the Protocol. For ease of reference the text of the Convention as amended by the Protocol is also enclosed.

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