15 March 2025 – Cracow University of Economics
The event took place on 15 March 2025 in the form of educational and disseminating lecture for university students. The lecture was provided remotely on TEAMS. The participants was the students of Master of Law (L.L.M.) postgraduate studies at the John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin. The lecture was delivered at the invitation of Professor Wojciech Staszewski, Chair of the Department of International and European Union Law, the Institute of Legal Sciences at the Faculty of Law, Canon Law and Administration at the John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin, and was a part of the classes of public international law. The meeting was attended by Prof. Staszewski and 32 students.
The students participating in the meeting were informed by Prof. Staszewski in advance (by the information on TEAMS group) that the part of the classes delivered by me will be recorded, and they had the opportunity to express their opposition, but no one did so, which is tantamount to giving consent to recording. They also were provided with the Privacy Notice which was distributed via TEAMS among them with the necessary information and the request to accept it.
My speech lasted about 35 minutes and was delivered in Polish (in accordance with the rules of conducting classes within which the meeting was held). It was recorded in its entirety, the recording is an attachment to this report. Before it began, Prof. Staszewski introduced me and my scientific competences and explained the nature of the meeting. The participants of the meeting were informed about the possibility of asking questions.
For the event I prepared the presentation, in which I used the logos of the Central European Academy and the Polish-Hungarian Professors’ Network. The title of my presentation was ‘The contemporary dimensions of protection of citizens staying abroad.European consular protection (in Polish: Współczesny wymiar opieki nad obywatelem przebywającym za granicą. Europejska opieka konsularna). Before I started my speech I introduced myself and stressed that it is a scientific meeting within the grant Changing foreign service conditions, conducted for the Central European Academy within the Polish-Hungarian Professors’ Network.
The first part of my speech was devoted to present Central European Academy, the Polish-Hungarian Professors’ Network and the grant Changing foreign service conditions (about 3 minutes, from 1:48 until 4:48). I explained that The Central European Academy (CEA), founded on 1 January 2022 with its seat in Budapest, is a separate legal entity of the University of Miskolc, which has a much longer tradition. I presented that CEA provides an institutional framework for strengthening international scientific cooperation between the countries of the Central European region by engaging established scientists with extensive experience and talented young researchers in line with the requirements of today’s challenges. It conducts publishing activities, postgraduate studies and a scholarship program for young scientists. After presenting CEA as such, I focused on the Professors’ Network, showing that it is a scientific cooperation platform, created within the CEA. I informed the participants that it was launched in 2021 to study current issues concerning the Central European region. Initially, it covered academic communities from 8 countries: Hungary, Poland, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Slovenia, Romania, Croatia and Serbia. Since 2024, the Central European Professors’ Network has also included Polish-Hungarian bilateral cooperation: Polish-Hungarian Professors’ Network. Currently, the entire network includes 184 professors and researchers from 53 universities in 15 countries. I also presented the scope of scientific topic within which I’ m doing my research: Changing foreign service conditions, under the leadership of Prof. Paweł Czubik from Cracow University of Economics.
The rest of my speeches was devoted to the issue of the contemporary dimensions of protection of citizens staying abroad (from 4:49 until 32:00).
The citizens of a particular State are under protection of this State while staying abroad. I begin with presenting the three legal dimensions of this protection: under international law, the European Union law and under domestic law. In international law, two forms of protection of citizens have developed: diplomatic protection and consular protection/assistance. The introduction of European Union citizenship under the Maastricht Treaty in 1992 also established the right of EU citizens to benefit from the protection by the diplomatic and consular authorities of any EU Member State. States also may be obliged to protect their nationals by their internal law, as it is in case of the Polish Constitution. According to art. 36 ’While staying abroad, a Polish citizen is entitled to protection from the Republic of Poland’.
I characterized the concept of consular protection and the legal basis for providing it. I analyzed the main provisions of the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations 1963 in this context. Then I moved on to explain the concept of diplomatic protection. I pointed out that the expression „diplomatic protection” is often used informally to mean the assistance given by diplomatic missions to their nationals, but it has its legal definition, adopted by the International Law Commission, that differs significantly. I stressed that diplomatic protection is connected with responsibility of States much more than with diplomacy or human rights protection. According to above mentioned definition, it „(…) consists of the invocation by a State, through diplomatic action or other means of peaceful settlement, of the responsibility of another State for an injury caused by an internationally wrongful act of that State to a natural or legal person that is a national of the former State with a view to the implementation of such responsibility”. In the most serious cases, it may involve bringing the case to the International Court of Justice, as was in Nottebohm (Liechtenstein v. Guatemala) and LaGrand (Germany v. United States of America) cases. I explained, that the expression „diplomatic protection” is still much more associated with its informal meaning (the assistance given by diplomatic missions to their nationals), since:
- the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations lists among the basic functions of diplomatic missions „protecting in the receiving State the interests of the sending State and of its nationals” (art. 3 (1) b); and
- because of the „shortcut”: the diplomatic missions may also perform consular functions by their consular section.
Then I presented the scope of consular assistance in the light of Polish regulations, primarily the Consular Law Act of 2015.
In the last part of my presentation I concentrated on the issue of protection of EU citizens abroad. I presented the contend of the main provisions of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU, art. 23) and the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union (art. 46) regarding this issue. I analyzed the regulations concerning European consular protection provided in Council Directive (EU) 2015/637 of 20 April 2015 on the coordination and cooperation measures to facilitate consular protection for unrepresented citizens of the Union in third countries and repealing Decision 95/553/EC (Directive 2015). I drew the participants’ attention to the goal of the Directive which is ensuring that unrepresented EU citizens receive help from other Member States’ consular services in emergencies. I explained the meaning of “unrepresented EU citizen”, which is every citizen who holds the nationality of a Member State not represented in a third country. A Member State is not represented in a third country:
- if it has no embassy or consulate established there on a permanent basis, or
- if it has no embassy, consulate or honorary consul there which is effectively in a position to provide consular protection in a given case.
I presented the scope of assistance: art. 9 of Directive 2015 outlines the types of consular protection which may be granted, it includes, inter alia, the following situations: arrest or detention; being a victim of crime; a serious accident or serious illness; death; relief and repatriation in case of an emergency; a need for emergency travel documents.
At the end I presented the proposition of amending the Directive 2015: in December 2023, the European Commission brought forward a proposal for a Council directive to amend Directive 2015. Its purpose is to facilitate consular protection for unrepresented citizens of the Union in third countries. The proposal clarifies when a Member State is not to be considered as represented in a third country due to the fact that it has no embassy or consulate effectively in a position to provide consular protection. It also improves the rules for cooperation in crisis situations and tends to make better use of the network of EU delegations and to involve it even more in activities for European consular protection.
After the presentation, the participants were encouraged to ask questions (including the chatroom).
Prof. Staszewski asked the question if the Directive 2015 is properly implemented to the Polish law system. My answer was generally positive. The adoption of Directive 2015 coincided with the parliamentary work on the largest amendment to consular law in Poland that has taken place in the last 40 years. While parliamentary work was still in progress, it was possible to introduce amendments to the draft new Polish Consular Law taking into account the new EU regulations. The new Polish Consular Law was adopted on 25 June 2015, about a month after adopting the Directive. It includes, for the first time, several provisions that directly concern providing consular assistance to EU citizens by Polish consuls, first of all art. 21, that asserts that “To the same extent as a Polish citizen, the consul shall provide consular assistance to a citizen of a European Union Member State that does not have a diplomatic representation or consular office on the territory of the receiving State that is not a European Union’ Member State, or if it is unable to provide consular assistance to this citizen in a given case”. Thus, the main obligation of Poland as an EU Member State provided in Article 23 TFEU was implemented.
The event also continued for a short time after the recording had ended. One of the students asked a question about the role of honorary consuls in the exercise of European consular protection. After my answer the meeting was ended.
