Diplomatic plates

Diplomatic be license plate called that for the members of a diplomatic mission or for the members of an international organization to be, which is active in the host country, spent. The official vehicles of the missions also receive diplomatic license plates. Employees of consular posts often receive special, but usually no diplomatic license plates. Honorary consuls often receive a normal civil registration number, but are allowed to attach an additional CC plate to their vehicle. The respective handling is not standardized internationally. The marking is required - also in this differentiation - to indicate the different privileges, immunities and exemptions of the respective vehicle occupants.

layout

As a rule, license plates for diplomats differ from normal license plates by a more conspicuous design, but there is no internationally standardized design. Many countries (in contrast to Germany and Austria ) use a colored background for diplomatic license plates , which sometimes leads to comparatively poor legibility (e.g. in Bosnia and Herzegovina ). Most countries use the letters CD for French. Corps Diplomatique . Vehicles of the consulates and the employees of the consular staff are marked with CC for Corps Consulaire as an additional plate (more rarely: already in the assigned license plate). Some states also assign the letters CMD for French. Chef de Mission Diplomatique on vehicles of the head of mission.

In some countries, in which the diplomatic status is not already derived from the assigned license plate , additional plates are used. Analogous to the nationality symbols, the additional labels read CC ( Corps Consulaire ) or CD ( Corps Diplomatique ). Depending on the country, these stickers can be designed in the colors of the corresponding labels. For example, Serbia uses black and yellow stickers, among other things , while dark blue and yellow ovals are common in Slovakia .

License plate for consular vehicles
License plates for diplomatic vehicles
CD sign on a Polish vehicle
CC sign on a German vehicle

Coding

In the case of diplomatic license plates, the combination of letters or numbers often indicates the country of origin of the diplomatic mission or the international organization. The assignment is usually arranged alphabetically or diachronically according to the start date of the bilateral relationships, so that the corresponding lists are necessary for decoding. In Great Britain , ambassadors often use wish-plates to get a sign with the abbreviation of the country's name. A consecutive number can be used in individual cases to infer the status of the vehicle owner, as ambassadors usually receive the lowest number in the series of awards. Due to the associated risk of falling victim to attacks, some countries have switched to using anonymous systems (e.g. in the Czech Republic ) or even assigning ordinary license plates to diplomats (e.g. Norway ).

National characteristics

Some countries (e.g. Serbia and North Macedonia ) provide the signs with the year of validity, so that the license plate must be renewed annually or the year must be pasted over.

In order to prevent diplomatic license plates from remaining abroad when a vehicle finally leaves the country, diplomats who leave the country are given separate license plates for single use. This is the case in Hungary , for example, and was also the case in the GDR .