on the ministry of foreign affairs specifically the department most likely to understand american procedure that happened in this case the ministry of foreign affairs  episode which was presented to the district court search process did does the record identify who it was who signed for the document other than the name and i assume it's a female of relied on to demonstrate that she complied with the requirements of service process primarily as the commercial and voice which was supplied to the court on a motion for reconsideration i believe that it was document number thirty three dash three of the work it clearly demonstrates that the ministry of foreign affairs was the key to receive that package we've previously stated in our brief that it certainly says the head of foreign affairs should be addressed but the cases alone i believe even the cases that this court has to has looked at where the focus has been on whether or not it's the ministry of foreign affairs that you see service of process many of the mistakes along the way in terms of service and so i won't go back over those but the point of which detail was was use it's our position that who it was compliant that there was no compliance with what requirements as i pointed out earlier as exhibit a to our motion for reconsideration it's documented in the docket below it's document thirty three that's three which has the commercial invoice in which the consignee name is ministry one and then the consignee name is minister of foreign affairs but this tells me what just so i know if i received this what would i know if you were sick that the ministry of foreign affairs should have this has received this should be receiving this package this is a this is a statement that it was sent to them or that they had received it that's what i'm trying to set to them sent to so where is the receipt the receipt is appendix page eight fifty six and there it is signed by an individual condemned them by the signature is very difficult to read all right but it's  when you go online with d h l you don't have this particular document as your picture you're filling out a form and this is the document that print it out and you've given up on having the clerk do service at this point no this was delivered to the required specifically in our papers we did not write i have to admit that we believe that we have complied especially in light of some of the lower court decisions which did not focus on as critically on the use of the term head of ministry of foreign affairs and when you look at the the evidence below which was a which was supplied in the opposition to the motion for reconsideration the athlete did supply the exhibit from the ever versus republic of sudan i believe that was that the case that we were mostly looking to would show that they had filled out a natural or so that so those are the distinctions between the two cases we had an online form the individual nec case had the paper but i think what is what i take away from judge bates decision below is really a focus on whether or not the plaintiff has all the procedures and and there's no argument that by the court below that the failure to use the paper form was what was a problem here it was just a simple it's simply whether men period court affairs and looking to the commercial invoice was sufficient enough to be in compliance below determined that it was not and i believe that receipt is still a factor here there's no argument look below by the apple e that that was never  and it certainly was there's no argument that it wasn't addressed to the ministry of foreign affairs i think the court really focused on the use of the term head of minister head of the ministry or minister and arguably if you look at the label  is that what do you do when it's there's this little bit of ambiguity and you have actual service plus and there's ambiguity about the accuracy of the mailing address and at least half of th screw ups here when the courts courts often well i'm not sure that the mailing address itself was accurate and that was not argued by it certainly wasn't an issue that the court raised i don't believe that we have raised it here  located and i believe the way that form got filled out when you completed everything online the focus is what's the building the person is supposed to who's delivering it what building are they supposed to go to and there will be a separate building for ministry of foreign there would be noncompliance if in fact it was just addressed to minister and the reason i say that is because again going back to the post from this court's decision entrance area the idea is that the people who understand the procedures of this court are who are deemed to be the minister of foreign affairs and so if in fact i had no firm to put minister that should have been can consider compliance and therefore i think if someone received that document and mid m i n was understood or was in the alternative was misunderstood i don't think they would have signed for it and so i think that's part of the reason why i argue that receipt i think is important and when you look at judge made its decision below and in the of her case i think it's very conscious about the fact that there's no second guessing in terms of compliance if there's no question about her seat and i would like the court to to at least give that some consideration and why these facts your mother about the proposition that congress put the words head up because otherwise there's immunity and concern about the vienna convention  cetera the fact that somebody in a ministry receives it is different from it being received by the head  that and that's why i go back to the argument that mr her if i think there's a presumption that the minister is the head of i don't think anyone would second guess that particular point and just as a a fact you the facts in this case it you know it's never really clear whether when the minister changes or who the minister is and that and the website itself i think once it's completely s goes to the post office box and picks up the mail and signs for it and you know she works down in the bowels of the ministry and who knows what happens to it as  from congress saying almost as a respect from one sovereign to another that we understand you have immunity but when soup is to be allowed we want to be certain that the head of the ministry is aware of this and you can think of a number of reasons why congress might be concerned about that negotiations with that country and sincere very sensitive matters and all of a sudden it's flooded with litigation all those sorts of things so it's not as though congress arguably didn't think about this question of who precisely should receive service as distinct from where as far as domestic service is concerned we allow for other forms actual notice you know good enough even if not perfect but now we're in a different realm and i thought that's what our court was getting at when it talk about strict compliance i think that the strict compliance in this instance is more than what is absolute it is required that where our ministry of foreign affairs and in my head of foreign affairs is there if i think the concern the court is raising is whether or not the use of the term head of ministry of foreign affairs would have been would  only that person would have received that document on the word move or the word minister and and given the fact that as you point out there's your box i doubt seriously that the minister of foreign affairs goes to that pill box to obtain those documents so as a person out so that the presumption is that there is certainly someone who is dispatches not the head of the ministry of foreign affairs but who may be responsible to that individual you're responsible to the people who are running that ministry and one is certainly argue that there are procedures inside that office that are to be followed when it d h l in below from the united states arrives and so i don't while i understand what the court is asking about the assurances the congress of seeking congress can only go so far in terms of what it wrote in the statute to assure that only the ministry of foreign affairs and i would i would probably have thought much longer about appealing this decision if none of the procedures have been complied with and albeit it took us a while to get there the position we're complied with and i think that the court especially given what happened early on maybe should have given exercise some discretion to allow us to address the envelope the way that the court thought it should be addressed especially since again there was no argument that it was not received there's no argument that the person that signed for it wasn't someone who gave it to the minister of foreign affairs of the head of the head of the minist because of who signed court that it was actually received by the minister for affairs and they haven't disputed that they have not are right thank you think right they answer me their town and they put it in the addressee had they addressed it to head of ministry of foreign affairs and then my question is if exactly the same thing where it says contact he said minister of foreign affairs if that is in fact the head of the ministry of foreign affairs sure but it has to be done you mean really what is the name of the foreign affairs the head of ministry of foreign affairs and family or the i don't know well i'm not the personal name is that the foreign affairs ok let's let's see if it's in your position is a bit said minister of foreign affairs that would not be sufficient no that's not my position my position is if that is the head of the ministry of foreign affairs of that particular country it dismissed the first service was just wrong by the courts office the second proposed service was correct except the district court made a change that maybe then correct i would add that it actually wasn't completely correct it didn't comply with the implementing regulation twenty two ninety three point two the c f r saying that money now you say it didn't comply they didn't comply how it didn't comply because there c f r ninety three point two and that particular so when the appellants suggests that when they contacted your client they were told to send it to the embassy here in question and you are here representing but my point is i had my point is if counsel representing the defendant doesn't know the answer it's interesting to me that you've got a situation where on a technical point the district court gets it wrong a corpse office gets it wrong and the plate had it right at one point except you're saying now didn't comply with these regulations that's in our brief as well but how can we make this easier for everybody i'm sorry how can i make what i'm sorry how can this be easier well if they had simply addressed it to the head of the ministry of foreign affairs using that  vanishingly did in the original without the compliance of twenty two c f r ninety three point to rights and what precisely did they need to do under that required to be submitted to the court not later than sixty days after these documents are received and i'm cutting out a lot of language and then another provision about questions related to state immunities and to the jurisdiction of united states courts overselling state the clerk's office is supposed to receive from counsel all of the documents that the plaintiff provided here plus check all of this correct and we'll know do you know whether the local rules of the district court have those procedures i don't know sitting here today but i will say that this is all very well laid out in the long and the case law and has been successfully done in many other o to the proper provision to be followed including the implementing regulation c f r ninety three point zero she says she got some information that was wrong all right then she got some information was right then the clerk's office didn't what it was supposed to do so she tried to solve the problem by mailing it i mean i'm just trying to understand why we're in this situation where congress writes this actually and presumably follow the words of the statute you're home free well we were the ones who actually alerted the court to the problem that was made well good for you but the point is why are we here on this case almost i mean it's clear that this is a minor thing that could be corrected right well the original complaint and we said no actually you need to follow six you know a day and you need to follow the implementing regulations and then there was a subsequent complaint filed and a subsequent attempt of service made and that one was again see or if you have the right p o box the right country city the right zip code country code and then you have attention minister of foreign affairs minister foreign affairs i think she would lose if there were if the addressee is embassy is india let me say this is not the first case i have said on where there is confusion in the embassy about proper service under the foreign service  mail it here and that was incorrect and that's why i'm trying to figure out what is it the district court's internal rules need to be clarified on this well i think our regulations that need to be home again because this is taking a lot of time and energy and we're not moving forward we seem to be just repeating these errors perhaps clarification would be well taken but i guess what i'd say about the phone call is and what i was intending to say earlier which i wasn't doing clearly enough because i wasn't part of a phone call i don't know whether they said i have a lawsuit that i want to send you what do i do maybe they just said i have a package should i send it to where it you know because we weren't on the phone call and there's no evidence in the record about what specifically was asked i think it's unfair to assume that the person was responding perhaps just a secretarial person not even a diplomat with authority to say where to there is at least an open question of the statute allows you to have an attention line or a contact line to satisfy how would you be your client be prejudice really if it's clarified and said go get it right this time here's what here's what it should look like go do it is there any real pressure on this yes i think there is because this is a foreign state and there has and the time time but there's been a lot of time in this this is causing a lot of my answer would be also that this is the statute is based on reciprocity and so we should also take into account that what we do here will potentially be replicated abroad and i think that giving a council that specifically informed lynn against reasonable opportunity but not unlimited opportunity is very smart for foreign relations as well as that's within the contours of the statute anything for now thank you thank you coun