Since 1997 over 150,000 tickets have gone unpaid
Photo: Meir Partousch
UN champion parking violators - Kuwait, Egypt
UN parking naughty or nice list: Israel surprises
Study examines foreign diplomats parking violations, shows Israel belonging to list of countries who paid all tickets in full. Highest parking violators – Kuwait and Egypt, each accumulating hundreds of unpaid tickets per year
WASHINGTON - Parking violations in Israel are nothing out of the ordinary and evading payment on ticket is something of a 'national sport', but outside the country's borders it appears that Israel plays by the book. Or so says a study examining the parking violations of diplomats from 146 countries serving in the UN headquarters in New York.
In the past Israeli diplomats took advantage of their diplomatic license plates and diplomatic immunity to park anywhere - anytime. But it appears that those shameful days have passed.
The findings of a study on the matter by Canadian economist Raymond Fishman from Columbia University and sociologist Edward Miguel from Berkley University were published Friday morning in the New York Times. The researchers determined that since 1997, foreign diplomats in New York have forgone payment on over 150 thousand tickets – some USD 18 million in unpaid tickets.
The researchers also say that they found a direct correlation between the list of parking violators and the results of the study by the World Bank on global corruption in the countries cited in the report. The study also says that the countries that did pay their fines – were also the countries with the least violations.
The UN's champion parking violator? Kuwait, with 246 unpaid tickets per diplomat per year – over the past five years. Egypt comes in second with half that amount, followed by Chad, Sudan, Bulgaria, Mozambique, Albania, Angola, Senegal, Pakistan, Cote d'Ivoire, Zambia, Morocco, Ethiopia, Nigeria, Syria, Benin and Cameroon.
Only 20 countries – including Israel – have paid all their parking tickets. The list includes Canada, Britain, Japan, Ireland, Norway, Denmark and Sweden.
And what does the US State Department do to diplomats who disregard the law? A diplomat who was caught violating parking laws twice, and does not pay his fine – will have his diplomatic license plate removed from his vehicle and he returns to being exposed to towing, fines and all the other penalties familiar to regular citizens.
