The vacant five-bedroom listed building on Upper Berkeley Street is located within Westminster's Central Activities Zone (CAZ) but outside the Core CAZ.
Although the loss of residential use is contrary to local planning policy, the Council's planning officers said in the committee report that they had considered the difficulty in finding suitable secure, self-contained diplomatic premises in central London and the low expected impact on the residential amenity of the area.
The report said that under the plans the building would operate in a similar manner to a small office building and would not be expected to create the level of activity which often characterise larger embassy buildings.
