IN THIS ISSUE
1. Fog in Channel, Continent Cut Off
2. The Effect Of Non-Payment Of Charter Hire
3. IUMI goes East
4. Crew of Naham 3
5. Cyber Security
6. People and Places
The Maritime Advocate–A Growing Concern
This publication, nicknamed "the Avo" passed
a milestone this summer. It has passed the 20 000 subscriber mark, the
highest total since its foundation in 2001. As a result of hand-ons
and internal republications within firms, it is fair to assume a total
readership of around 60 000 located in 120 countries. This gives the
Avo a very wide footprint in the maritime world. If you have a message
or product to promote or circulate, the Avo can promise to get the word
out at affordable rates. Give us a try.
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1. Fog in Channel, Continent Cut Off
We hear the complaint often these days that the legal implications
of Brexit are still unclear. For those who like some legal flesh on
the conceptual bone we can do no better than to refer our readers to
the materials prepared by our friends at Brick Court Chambers wherein
may be found a number of couldn’t be plainer examinations of the what
has to be done in key areas like jurisdiction, enforcement and evidence.
The materials are taken from a seminar held under the presiding Helen
Davies QC.
http://tinyurl.com/foginchannel
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2. The Effect Of Non-Payment Of Charter Hire
Gavin Ritchie of the Charterers P&I Club writes:-
Recently the English Court of Appeal handed down an important decision
on the effect of charterers failing to pay full and punctual hire to
owners.
Earlier decisions by the Commercial Court had reached conflicting conclusions
as to whether this amounts to a breach of condition allowing owners
to terminate the charter and claim damages in relation to the unexpired
period of the charter.
Whereas in the ASTRA case the judge ruled that payment of hire was
a condition, a subsequent judgment in the case Spar Shipping v Grand
China Logistics held that a failure to pay hire does not automatically
give owners the right to claim damages.
The Court of Appeal judgement reached on the latter case has delivered
much desired guidance and clarification of the law on these issues.
Read our e-Bulletin by Carlos Vasquez, here:-
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3. IUMI goes East
Word reaches us that IUMI is setting up a hub office in Hong Kong.
The time for this is good. The Asian marine insurance market accounts
for almost 30% of global premium income. The hope is "to align
IUMI more closely with the activities and aspirations of colleagues
in Asia". Historians might see the development of this hub as the
dawning of the realisation that an agreeable club of Atlantic insurers
and mittel european professional reinsurers was not enough to deal with
the implications and unwindings of maritime mega events like the Tianjin
Port explosions.
Time and tide will tell whether the peculiarities of what the Germans
call "informationspolitik" in the region will be a feature
in the Hong Kong hub. The Hong Kong Federation of Insurers will provide
the secretariat and use its formidable powers of persuasion to get the
region’s members to provide good numbers, timely settlements and other
topical items.
Well done the marinos of Hong Kong who have in recent years worked
very hard to create a maritime hub which spans the occupations, specialisations
and niches of the spectrum of our industry.
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Henry.Hill@worldwidecurrencies.com…………………….+44 (0)20
3326 4514
4. Crew of Naham 3
Richard Neylan of hfw sent in word of this happy coda to the Somali
piracy wave which reports the release of 26 hard pressed mariners:-
Nairobi, Kenya – 22 October 2016: The Hostage Support Partners
announce the release of the 26 remaining hostages of the FV Naham 3.
The Omani flagged fishing vessel was hijacked on 26 March 2012 roughly
65 nautical miles south of the Seychelles. Of the original 29-member
crew, sadly one died during the hijacking and two more succumbed to
illness during their captivity. The remaining 26 crewmembers spent much
of their captivity on land in Somalia. The crew of the Naham 3 consisted
of members from Cambodia, China, Indonesia, Philippines, Taiwan and
Vietnam.
“We are very pleased to announce the release of the Naham 3 crew
early this morning. They are currently in the safe hands of the Galmudug
authorities and will be repatriated using a UN Humanitarian flight shortly
and then on to their home countries. They are reported to be in reasonable
condition considering their ordeal. They are all malnourished. Four
are currently receiving medical treatment by a Doctor in Galcayo. They
have spent over four and a half years in deplorable conditions away
from their families,” said John Steed the Coordinator of the Hostage
Support Partners (HSP) for Oceans Beyond Piracy. I would like to thank
the efforts of our Partners, the Galmudug authorities and the local
community who made this release possible. In particular, the efforts
of Mr Leslie Edwards of Compass Risk Management who has spent the last
18 months negotiating this release, and the work of Holman Fenwick Willan
LLP, should be applauded."
For a full text of the announcement and a picture of the crew members
click here:-
http://oceansbeyondpiracy.org/somali-pirates-release-crew-fv-naham-3
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IT man Marco Tapia writes:-
With more and more high profile cyber security incidents being made
public, awareness of the importance of cyber security continues to steadily
increase. Our Government via its Australian Cyber Security Centre (ACSC)
has released a comprehensive report highlighting the threats we face
and what we should be doing about them.
Read the report in full here:-
https://www.acsc.gov.au/publications/ACSC_Threat_Report_2016.pdf
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6. People and Places
Rosita Lau, Partner in the Hong Kong office of international law firm
Ince & Co, has been awarded the individual prize at the Lloyd’s
List Asia Awards, winning the Asia Maritime Lawyer of The Year Award.
Originally from Hong Kong, Rosita has been with Ince & Co for more
than 25 years and is a leading figure in the firm’s marine sector.
She specialises in shipping litigation and marine insurance, actively
representing clients in Asia Pacific. She has also been involved in
some of the leading maritime disputes in Hong Kong. Rosita has consistently
been recognised by legal directories as a leading shipping lawyer in
Asia Pacific and since 2011 has been a member of the Hong Kong Maritime
Industry Council, the highest advisory body to the Government on the
formulation of maritime policy.
In the last 12 months, Rosita has also been heavily involved in public
service. She was appointed as the only lawyer to advise the Financial
Services Development Council (“FSDC”) on the development of
the insurance business – in particular maritime insurance – through
her capacity as a member of a special advisory group. She was also appointed
as a member of the Hong Kong Maritime and Port Board (“HKMPB”)
of the Hong Kong Government, following her service on the Maritime Industry
Council. The HKMPB is a high-level body established by the Hong Kong
Government at the direction of the Chief Executive of Hong Kong.
———-
Inmarsat Maritime the satellite communications company, has announced
the appointment of Mark Warner as Head of Marketing Communications for
its Maritime business unit.
———-
The UK P&I Club has announced that Jan Döhle has been selected
as this year’s Robin Travis Scholar.
Jan has an MSc in Shipping, Trade and Finance and is qualified as a
member of the Institute of chartered ship brokers. He has already gained
relevant shipping experience working for a ship operator in Germany
and for a short spell with insurance brokers in London. Upon completion
of his scholarship, Jan will be joining Döhle Assekuranzkontor
GmbH & Co. KG, in order to further extend his educational and shipping
experience.
———-
Hill Dickinson has added to its London shipping team with the arrival
of Master Mariner Donal Keaney who brings the total number of Master
Mariners at the firm to six. Donal is currently studying to become admitted
as a solicitor and joins Hill Dickinson from a varied seagoing, commercial
and legal background. He recently spent three years with a Hong Kong
legal practice, where he worked on a varied caseload of both wet and
dry matters, including attendances and casualty investigations on site.
A member of the Institute of Chartered Shipbrokers, Donal previously
worked as an offshore broker for Clarksons. He has also worked in ship
management, in both technical and marine & safety roles and has
lectured in coastal navigation and the International Regulations for
Preventing Collisions at Sea at Liverpool John Moores University. During
his sea-going career, Donal was employed on gas carriers, container
vessels, Ro-Ro and Ro-Pax ferries and passenger ships.
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From the Avo Archive
The website of this newsletter contains all the editorial material
since the inception of the Maritime Advocate as a print based quarterly
in 1997 under the founding aegis of John Guy, Chris Hewer and Manfred
Arnold. Readers can go to the site and search the database on the home
page in its entirety. If you are looking for an old case, an old controversy
or you would just like to see how many times you and your firm have
featured in our annals feel free to access the archive. It is like this
e-zine, free to Readers and we always appreciate the support of advertisers
and sponsors.
Wondering if the term cyber was much in use in the Avo we ran across
this piece which appeared in Issue 416 on 5th December 2009:-
Climategate
Pity the Climate Research Unit (CRU) at the University of East Anglia.
Which one of us would escape censure if our electronic paper trail were
laid bare to our enemies, not to say every kook and crank on the internet?
Many readers will by now know that an enormous cache (160MB) of CRU
e-mail messages, files, programmes and datasets became available on
the internet a few weeks before the Copenhagen summit which, once analysed,
suggested that the data being used was incomplete and the plotting of
the data left quite a lot to be desired. Your editor has spent a while
browsing the CRU affair on the internet and concludes that "the
need to show your workings" demanded by maths teachers the world
over seems to have been glossed over in the operations and history of
the CRU. Why does Climategate matter? A rather good article to answer
the question:-
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/11/30/crugate_analysis/
Where might the law and lawyers get a look in over Climategate? Well
if the work of the CRU is as shoddy as is being declaimed in cyberspace
this cold,wet December, and if the reliance upon it by the UN and governments
has been misplaced, one might well expect to see some actions in private
and public law which reflect the price of introducing doubt into heads
where previously there was much greater certainty.
One confusion running through the affair is the role played by temperature
measurements at sea. It seems that at times these have been included
in climate models and at other times not. A recent effort to bring to
light historic temperature measurements made at sea can be appreciated
at the site below:-
http://www.corral.org.uk/Home
The Climategate affair seems to us to look like one of those cases
where science, politics, financial agendas and popular movements have
collided to provide us with no end of a lesson.
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Dashcams Down Under
Our good friends over at the Handy Shipping Guide have sent these heart
racing incidents involving the truckers of Australia as captured by
dashcams. The comments from the truckers might be described as oath-like.
http://dashcamownersaus.com.au/blog/2016/10/10/what-truck-drivers-put-up-with-daily/
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Being Lucky
A blond woman named Shannon found herself in dire trouble. Her business
had gone bust and she was in serious financial trouble. She was so desperate
that she decided to ask God for help. She began to pray.
"God, please help me. I’ve lost my business and if I don’t get
some money, I’m going to lose my house as well. Please let me win the
lotto."
Lotto night came and somebody else won. Shannon again prayed. "God,
please let me win the lotto! I’ve lost my business, my house, and I’m
going to lose my car as well."
Lotto night came and Shannon still had no luck. Once again she prayed.
"My God, why have you forsaken me? I’ve lost my business, my house,
and my car. My children are starving. I don’t often ask you for help
and I have always been a good servant to you. Please just let me win
the lotto this one time so I can get my life back in order."
Suddenly there was a blinding flash of light as the heavens opened,
and Shannon was confronted by the voice of God Himself. "Shannon,
meet Me halfway on this. Buy a ticket."
[Paul Dixon]
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Thanks for Reading the Maritime Advocate online
Maritime Advocate Online is a weekly digest of news and views on the
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resolution. It is published to over 20 000 individual subscribers each
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