Department of Foreign Affairs spent almost €1.4m on diplomatic bags

Darragh McDonagh

The Department of Foreign Affairs has spent almost €1.4 million in the past two years on diplomatic bags – special pouches typically used to transport documents and other items between embassies.

The official use of the bags came under scrutiny in 2022 after it emerged that they had been deployed to send novelty socks and empty gift bags from Dublin to New York – prompting the department to issue a reminder to staff about “appropriate use”.

However, the amount of money spent sending diplomatic bags between the department and its overseas missions has continued to increase since then.

Records released under the Freedom of Information Act stated that dispatching the special pouches had cost more than €2 million in 2023 and 2024. However, the department later said this was a “clerical error” and put the actual figure at just under €1.4 million.

Diplomatic bags are afforded special status under international law, meaning that they cannot be opened or detained by officials in other countries, and their couriers enjoy diplomatic protection.

Use of the expensive courier system was questioned after it was used to transport 22 empty gift bags from Dublin to Ireland’s UN mission in New York for the country’s bid to win a seat on the Security Council.

The same bags had earlier been delivered to Iveagh House in Dublin from a supplier based in New York.

At the time, People Before Profit TD Paul Murphy linked a sharp increase in the spend on diplomatic bags to the Security Council bid, claiming that “sending novelty socks… had cost the public €100,000”.

He called for “much stricter rules” to ensure that the bags were only used for “necessary official work”.

A spokesman for the Department of Foreign Affairs said the diplomatic bag service was used to transmit post, official documents and equipment to and from Ireland’s network of 103 diplomatic and consular missions worldwide.

“The diplomatic bag is used for official purposes only and generally includes items such as citizens’ passports, return of official documents to citizens, visas, ICT equipment, diplomatic mail, etc.,” he said.

The spokesman described diplomatic bags as “an essential and confidential service” that is regulated under the Vienna Convention, which protects the confidentiality of the contents of the bag as it is not allowed to be opened or inspected.

“On an annual basis, an average of 5,000 diplomatic bags are sent and received by the department’s registry team based at HQ… The cost in 2023 was €670,757 and in 2024 was €725,430,” he added, explaining that figures contained in records released by the department contained a “clerical error”.