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Your Country’s Embassy, Chancery, or Diplomatic Mission As someone who will be traveling extensively overseas it is important to understand what the role of an embassy, chancery, or diplomatic mission is. That way you will understand what sorts of matters they can help you with and what sorts of matters they can’t.
Embassies and Chanceries vs. Consulates You may think of consulates to some extent as branch offices of an embassy or chancery. Like embassies, they function as an official diplomatic presence of one country within another. They perform many of the same tasks as an embassy or chancery, such as issuing visas to foreign nationals, and they may even specialize in certain roles that the embassy has little involvement with. For example, the U.S. embassy in Viet Nam is located in Ha Noi; however, the consulate in Sai Gon is where the American Chamber of Commerce is based. Whereas embassies are typically located in the capitol city for a given country, consulates tend to be located in other important cities within the same territory.
What Embassies, Chanceries, and Diplomatic Missions Do The primary role of a diplomatic mission is to represent the interests of one nation with respect to another. In that regard, an Ambassador (the highest-ranking official at an Embassy) will represent his or her country at official gatherings, state dinners, and the like. The diplomatic mission is also responsible for official communication between states - for example, if the U.K. government takes an official stand about something in Armenia, the diplomatic mission of the U.K. in Armenia will have responsibility for formally communicating such to the Armenian government. Diplomatic missions may also be given latitude to negotiate certain matters with the local governments concerned.
Another role of diplomatic missions is to foster trade between countries. In this regard, they may operate tourist information offices in various locations overseas, and they may host trade events around the world. The Australian government, whose United States embassy is in Washington D.C., maintains a consulate and tourist information center in New York City whose role, among other things, is to encourage new trade relationships and to strengthen existing ones.
Yet another role of a diplomatic mission is to vet and approve those who wish to travel to the mission’s home country by issuing visas and residency documents. On a similar note, they will re-issue passports for their own citizens if one expires, is lost, or is stolen.
Finally, they will act to ensure the safety of their nationals in the event of a personal or national emergency, public crisis, or conflict of laws. Each country defines what it considers to be a “personal emergency” on its own. Generally, if you become very ill, are the victim of a serious crime, or are involved in a serious accident, they will try to help you as an individual. If you simply run out of funds or lose your travel documents (your passport being an exception), they are very likely unable to assist you. You should clarify how your own government defines a “personal emergency” for each country you arrive in, if you feel that such information may be vital given the purpose of your trip and your intended activities.
For national emergencies or a public crisis, a diplomatic mission may arrange for emergency shelter or evacuation of one or all of its nationals.
If a citizen of one country goes astray with the laws of another, the diplomatic mission from his or her home country may attempt to intervene if there is a conflict of laws or if the issue at hand seems harsh or unjust. In that role, it is important to remember that when traveling in a foreign land, you are subject to its local laws, regardless of whether such laws would be considered legal and enforceable in your home country. That means if someone finds himself in trouble outside his home country, there may be little his country’s embassy or consulate can do for him.
What Embassies, Chanceries, and Diplomatic Missions Don’t Do Governments often operate trade development and tourist information offices in foreign countries. The role of those offices is to encourage trade and travel in the home country, not in the country where they operate such facilities. As such, they will not be able to offer their own nationals advice on tourist destinations near where they are located or anywhere else. They also cannot help their citizens arrange for visas to other countries, and they won’t give advice on particular travel arrangements. |
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Crossing from Nepal to India
© Stephen Braun |
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