Japan owes London more than 1 mil pounds in fines, road charges

The Japanese Embassy in London has racked up more than 1 million pounds worth of unpaid road charges and penalty fines in a diplomatic dispute with city chiefs. Transport for London, the body which controls the capital's public transportation network, revealed recently that the embassy owes it a total of 1,003,300 pounds (approximately $2 million).
The embassy is refusing to pay the central London "charge" because it believes that it is, in fact, a tax which diplomats are immune from paying under the 1961 Vienna Convention which governs diplomatic relations. Several other missions have also stopped paying the 8 pounds daily congestion charge when they enter and drive in central London.
The biggest debtor is the United States which owes over 2 million pounds and Japan is currently in second place. More than 10 million pounds is owed by 20 embassies, according to Transport for London. A spokesman for the Japanese Embassy in London said the Japanese government had assessed the relevant laws in August 2006 and came to the conclusion its diplomatic staff should not pay. This is because they could not see that a specific service was being provided by the charge and that it is merely another tax, to which diplomats and their families are exempt.