Dozens of foreign embassies across London are refusing to pay their share of business rates bills which fund street cleaning and lighting outside their embassies.
The Standard can reveal that 51 embassies and diplomatic missions owe the taxman £670,000 with the deficits being funded by struggling high street firms.
It follows years of pressure being applied to ambassadors over millions in unpaid congestion zone fines and parking tickets which a handful refuse to pay.