Arif:
>Since I started the virtual enclave debate, I feel I
>should say something. I never actually included the
>Vatican enclaves as true virtual enclaves, as I am not
>sure what the Italian position on the areas is.
The Lateran Treaty certainly makes a clear distinction between the
Vatican and these other properties: it uses words
like "sovereignty", "dominion" and "jurisdiction" for the Vatican,
but "ownership", "management" and "administration" for the other
sites. It also says that such sites have the "immunity granted by
international law to the headquarters of the diplomatic agents of
foreign states".
I'm conflicted about this: the above pretty clearly makes the
external sites rather poor virtual enclaves analoguous to foreign
embassies; but nowhere (in the Treaty or outside it) have I found any
clear statement of how the external sites are treated in any way
differently from the Vatican itself.
I suppose the problem may simply be that "sovereignty" doesn't really
achieve its full meaning when applied to the Vatican, which is
basically a few large buildings full of staff, so that there is no
real room for contrast between the "sovereign" Vatican and
the "extraterritorial" Papal Villa. Or is there some subtlety in
international law which means that if Italy grants sovereignty to the
Vatican it can never legally backtrack, whereas it can legally
rescind the assignment of lesser concepts like ownership and
administration?
Another problem I'm mildly surprised by is my difficulty in finding a
current, authoritative list of the Vatican's extraterritorial
holdings. Some sources say "10 buildings in Rome", some say "13". But
I've certainly accumulated more candidates than that, and the Lateran
Treaty includes sites that I haven't seen listed elsewhere (as well
as making non-specific references to various other buildings). The
waters are muddied farther by the fact that places like the Gregorian
University and the Oriental Institute, granted tax-exemption but not
extraterritoriality in the Lateran Treaty, are sometimes referred to
as if they were extraterritorial.
Grant