A reader writes re my posting on Locally Employed Embassy Staff:

Yes, but you are rather glossing over the fact that a brutal regime can be far more brutal to its own nationals than it can to foreign diplomats. Indeed protection from brutality is the origin of the convention of immunity.

In Iran also you have the levantine history of "capitulations" which makes the whole question of protection of local nationals even more politically sensitive. In these circumstances is it right that the UK should take on employees knowing the kind of risk to which they could be subjected?

My reply:

Fair points.

Don’t forget that some people want to work for a foreign Embassy precisely as a gesture of defiance of some sort to the local regime (see eg some of the Yugoslavs who worked for us for many years in Belgrade). Or simply because in a British Embassy they will get fair and respectful treatment at work plus some sort of redress if things go wrong, unlike in most jobs in their own country.

Plus they may think (rightly) that in some ways they are a bit protected working for an Embassy, since nasty behaviour towards them risks prompting an international scandal (as in this case). 

I am not familiar with the profile of the local staff in the Tehran Embassy. But I suspect that some of them have worked for us for a good while. These people are far better placed to understand and manage the risks (and maybe do something about them) than we are. And the outlandish behaviour of the regime in quite this form was not exactly to be expected.

The other side of course is the fact that they or their relatives may come under pressure to ‘cooperate’ with the regime in spying on British staff. Again, little to be done about that other than to accept it as a risk and work round it. It is another reason why in practice a regime may not be too hard on local Embassy employees – keep them sweet, just in case..?

In short, of course it is right to take on local staff in these places. Many people will see us a local beacon of hope, and it may well be less dangerous supporting local reform while working in an Embassy than it is doing the same thing from within the system.