Counter-piracy: BIMCO's GUARDCON Contract INTERTANKO Endorsed
INTERTANKO’s Documentary Committee endorses BIMCO's newly published standard contract for Private Armed Guards (GUARDCON). GUARDCON has now been in use for some months. During this time the Documentary Committee has reviewed the GUARDCON wording and, as the use of private armed guards has proliferated, has considered it against a backdrop of other contracts for the use of private armed guards. The Committee found that private armed guard contracts vary in content and standard, with some being unclear and/or unfavourable to owners. In some, legal rights and obligations of the parties are ill-defined. At the second Documentary Committee meeting of 2012…
BIMCO Issues New Ice Clauses
When the Documentary Committee of BIMCO met on November 14, 2002 in Copenhagen, Denmark, they agreed to adopt a revision of its General Ice Clause for voyage charter parties. The revision of the General Ice Clause forms part of an undertaking to review over time a series of well-known BIMCO standard clauses to reflect legal and commercial developments. The amendments have been made because the existing ice clause was found to be deficient in a number of ways, in particular that the vessel should not be required to follow ice breakers or to force ice. It was also felt that provisions were needed to protect the owners against the risk of ice being experienced on the approach voyage. Consequently a revised General Ice Clause has been drafted to take the above concerns into consideration.
