"I actually made them do a reevaluation of the whole waitlist looking for people who want kids as much as you - I think we should weigh it more. There might be no sense which shows up on the statistics in which you are high-priority, but - I think that means we're setting priority wrong. Anyway, we haven't found anything like you. I don't know if this is the particular thing you want to hammer on, but whatever things you want to hammer on, I think you're going to be in a position to make them happen. 

Would it make a difference if it were only murderers at risk of alien arrest, I can ask the legal side to register some factual determinations about Amentan international law that'd amount to that."

"How would that work?"

"So the categories are murder, rape, torture, enslavement, forcible deportation. What we do is hire a bunch of really good lawyers to go file an emergency petition to the effect that Amentan international law already prohibits those, therefore it should be on the record that Amentans can't get section-16ed because local law is adequate. Except local law doesn't consider killing of reds to be murder and we do, so local law is adequate except with respect to the category of killings of reds. ...or is raping and torturing them legal, I expect a really good lawyer could win this if the penalties are pretty light but there's no way in hell if it's just outright legal."

"I think that depends on the place. It'd usually at least get you pollution violation if you couldn't prove you went through decontam every time."

Ambassador makes a face. "So as soon as we figure out how to relocate the reds, a section 16 injunction breezes through, and until then it'll be talking to a brick wall."

"Why is forcible deportation on there anyway, are you supposed to give illegal immigrants a fruit basket?"

"Whole phrase is 'arbitrary deportation or forcible transfer of whole populations'. Deporting people who committed a crime or aren't citizens isn't relevantly arbitrary. Clearing out a conquered province for your people to live there would count, though. - if we'd gotten here forty years ago would you have wanted us to say to the Oahk Empire - 'that looks pretty ugly...it's legal locally? okay, I guess...'"

"Nobody sings the praises of the last Emperor of Oahk except edgy political science students. But I'm wondering what you'd do if you considered local custom and law a meaningful constraint instead of something you can section sixteen according to your own culture instead."

"We'd only make contact with societies that weren't up to things we couldn't overlook. The Federation runs on a model a bit like that. They're neighbors of yours - haven't said hello, obviously."

"What's their problem with us?" he sighs. "Also reds?"

"They object to the rest of the caste system too."

"...really?"

"I will send you a copy of the Federation charter. They also demand a unified world government, I think just for administrative simplicity?

Honestly the caste system seems pretty strange to us too, but we draw our line about where to stop respecting local culture at rape torture and murder."

"Would you or for that matter the Federation demand a zero rate of unprosecuted murder or are you just making a point of the reds because it's a news item at home?"

"Oh, we've been keeping the reds the hell out of the news at home, that would be a disaster, I guarantee you there'd be university student groups trying to sneak here to take reds home with them. There were journalists on the Rivikni thing but that's because we self-police really strongly on causing crimes here, and I think they're reporting it as some Rivikni eccentricity being appropriately handled. But to answer your question - if another murder came to our attention we'd forward you the evidence from conjuration and trust you to take it from there - you have a really good justice system, and I don't think I'm just jaded by wading through dysfunctional ones. The problem is gonna be when we run across a dead body and no local law to hand it off to. Honestly, if it were illegal to torture reds but the penalty were a week in prison we wouldn't have a leg to stand on, that's an extant system and we defer to those wherever they exist."

"Rivik's going to be particularly stubborn, about reds."

"Why exactly -"

"Oh, nobody likes them, Rivik just actually hates them."

"Have the Rivikni ones rioted more so there's more open tensions..."

"I don't think so. Every now and then one does something outrageous - goes and bludgeons someone half to death and then jumps off a building or something."

"...that, uh, sounds. Implausible."

"I don't mean 'they keep reaching for armed cops', that's cops blowing off steam, that happens everywhere."

"Uh huh."

"We don't let them do that here, it does take years to grow a new red and it's almost always the ones with jobs we need done."

Sigh. "I am glad to hear that."