In fact, British law nowhere explicitly states that such immunity extends to a former, as opposed to a serving, head of state (none of the Law Lords disputed that a serving head of state enjoys immunity).

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Also muddying the case are assurances of immunity initially given to the guards by State Department diplomatic security agents, who were investigating the incident before the FBI tried to interview them once it took over.

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Lord Bingham concluded that a former head of state enjoys immunity as well because one English statute confers on a head of state the same legal protections as those enjoyed by an ambassador, which a second statute spells out as including immunity for official acts during his tenure as an ambassador even after he has left his post.

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There is no evidence that many people took up his previous offers, or that the state ever honoured its promises of immunity, he adds.

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That order granted private security contractors immunity from prosecution in Iraq but made them subject to the law of their "sending state".

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Further, due to the sovereign immunity conferred on the states by The Constitution, the opportunity to push the state into involuntary bankruptcy is out of the question.

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