In this Convention, the following terms are used, with the meanings indicated below:

1. "Maritime Creance" means an allegation of a right or claim having one of the following causes:

A.

Damage caused by a ship either by collision or otherwise;

B.

Loss of life or personal injury caused by a ship or from the operation of a ship;

C.

Assistance and rescue;

D.

Contracts relating to the use or rental of a ship by charter party or otherwise;

E.

Contracts for the carriage of goods by a ship under a charter party, or otherwise;

F.

Losses or damage to goods and baggage carried by a ship;

G.

Common variation;

H.

Ready to big;

I.

Remorking;

J.

Pilotage;

K.

Supplies, in any place, of products or equipment made to a ship for the purpose of its operation or maintenance;

L.

Construction, repairs, equipment of a ship or bilge;

M.

Salts of the Captain, Officers or Men of Equipment;

N.

Captain's disbursements and those carried out by shippers, charterers or agents on behalf of the ship or its owner;

O.

The disputed ownership of a ship;

P.

The disputed co-ownership of a ship or its holding, or its operation, or the rights to the operating products of a co-ownership vessel;

Q.

Any maritime mortgage and any pledge.

2. "Seizure" means the detention of a ship with the authorization of the competent judicial authority for the guarantee of a maritime claim, but does not include the seizure of a ship for the performance of a title.

3. "Person" includes any natural or legal person, a partnership or capital person, as well as the States, the Administrations and the Public Institutions.

4. "Applicant" means a person, relying on his or her profit, for the existence of a maritime claim.

A ship flying the flag of one of the Contracting States may not be seized in the jurisdiction of a Contracting State only under a maritime claim, but nothing in the provisions of this Convention shall be regarded as an extension Or a restriction of the rights and powers that States, Public Authorities or Port Authorities hold of their domestic law or regulations, seize, detain or otherwise prevent a ship from taking the sea in their jurisdiction.

1. Without prejudice to the provisions of s. 4 and art. 10, any Applicant may seize either the ship to which the debt relates, or any other ship owned by the person who was, at the time the marine claim was born, the owner of the ship to which that claim relates, even as the ship Shall be ready to sail, but no ship shall be seized for a claim under paragraphs o, p or q of Article 1 with the exception of the ship itself which relates to the claim.

2. Ships will be deemed to have the same owner when all ownership shares are owned by the same person or persons.

3. A ship may not be seized and surety or guarantee shall be given, more than once in the jurisdiction of one or more of the Contracting States, for the same claim and by the same Applicant; and if a ship is seized in one of the said courts And a guarantor or guarantee has been given, either to obtain the release of the seizure, or to avoid it, any subsequent seizure of that ship, or any other ship, belonging to the same owner, by the Requester and for the Same maritime claim, shall be lifted and the ship shall be discharged by the Court of First Instance or any other competent court State, unless the Applicant proves, to the satisfaction of the Court of First Instance or any other competent judicial authority, that the guarantee or surety has been definitively released before the subsequent seizure has been carried out or Has another valid reason for maintaining it.

4. In the case of a charter of a ship with a surrender of the nautical management, where the charterer responds, alone, of a maritime claim relating to that ship, the Applicant may seize that ship or that other belonging to the charterer, observing the Provisions of this Convention, but no other ship owned by the owner may be seized under this maritime claim.

The preceding paragraph also applies to all cases where a person other than the owner is required to have a marine claim.

A ship may be seized only with the permission of a Tribunal or any other competent judicial authority of the Contracting State in which the seizure is carried out.

The Court of First Instance or any other competent judicial authority in whose jurisdiction the vessel has been seized shall release the seizure where sufficient security or security has been provided, except in the case where the seizure is carried out in As a result of the sea claims listed in item 1 above, under the letters o and p; in this case, the judge may permit the operation of the ship by the Possessor, where the processor has provided sufficient guarantees, or the management of the Vessel for the duration of the seizure.

In the absence of an agreement between the Parties on the importance of the guarantor or guarantee, the Tribunal or the competent judicial authority shall determine the nature and the amount.

The request for release of the seizure under such a guarantee shall not be construed as a recognition of liability, nor as a waiver of the legal limitation of the liability of the shipowner.

Any disputes relating to the responsibility of the Applicant, for damages caused as a result of the seizure of the vessel or for the costs of security or security provided for the purpose of releasing or preventing the seizure of the vessel, shall be governed by the law of the State Contractant in whose jurisdiction the seizure was carried out or applied for.

The rules of procedure for the seizure of a ship, in obtaining the authorization referred to in s. 4 and any other procedural incidents that an attachment may raise are governed by the law of the Contracting State in which the seizure was carried out or requested.

(1) The courts of the State in which the seizure has been made shall be competent to rule on the merits of the case:

-

Whether those Tribunals are competent under the domestic law of the State in which the seizure is made;

-

In the following cases, specifically defined:

A.

If the Applicant has his or her habitual residence or principal place of business in the State in which the seizure was made;

B.

If the maritime claim is itself born in the Contracting State on which the place of the seizure depends;

C.

If the sea claim was incurred during a voyage during which the seizure was made;

D.

If the debt is due to a collision or under the circumstances of s. 13 of the International Convention for the Unification of Certain Collision Rules, signed at Brussels on 23 September 1910 ¹ ;

E.

If the claim arose from assistance or a rescue;

F.

If the debt is secured by a maritime mortgage or a death-pledge on the seized vessel.

2. If the Court of First Instance, in whose jurisdiction the ship has been seised, does not have jurisdiction to rule on the merits, the surety or the guarantee to be provided in accordance with Art. 5 to obtain the release of the seizure, must guarantee the execution of all the convictions which would subsequently be pronounced by the competent Court of First Instance, and the Court of First Instance or any other judicial authority in the place of Shall fix the time limit in which the Applicant will be required to bring an action before the competent Court.

3. If the conventions of the parties contain either an agreement conferring jurisdiction on another court or an arbitration clause, the Court of First Instance may fix a time limit within which the striking party will have to take its action on the merits.

4. In the cases provided for in the two preceding paragraphs, if the action is not brought within the time limit, the Respondent may request the release of the seizure or the release of the security provided.

5. This Article shall not apply to the cases covered by the provisions of the Revised Convention on the Navigation of the Rhine of 17 October 1868 ² .

1. The provisions of this Convention shall apply in any State Contractant to any ship flying the flag of a Contracting State.

2. A ship flying the flag of a non-Contractant State may be seized in one of the Contracting States, under one of the claims listed in Art. 1, or any other claim for seizure under the law of that State.

3. However, each Contracting State may refuse all or part of the advantages of this Convention to any non-contracting State and to any person who has not, on the day of the seizure, his habitual residence or principal place of business in a Contractant State.

4. Nothing in this Convention shall affect or affect the internal law of the Contracting States in respect of the seizure of a ship within the jurisdiction of the State of which it beats the flag by a person having his habitual residence or his or her habitual residence. Principal place of business in that State.

5. Any third party, other than the original Applicant who pleads a sea claim by the effect of subrogation, assignment or otherwise, shall be deemed, for the purposes of this Convention, to have the same habitual residence or the same Principal establishment that the originating creditor.

Nothing in this Convention should be regarded as creating a right to an action which, apart from the provisions of that Convention, would not exist according to the law to be applied by the Court of First Instance.

This Convention does not confer on the Applicants any resale rights, other than that granted by the latter Law or by the International Convention for the Unification of Certain Rules Relating to Maritime Privileges and Mortgages ¹ If applicable.

The High Contracting Parties may, at the time of signature of the deposit of ratifications or upon accession to the Convention, reserve themselves

A.

The right not to apply the provisions of this Convention to the seizure of a ship in respect of one of the maritime claims referred to in Article 1 (o) and (p) and to apply their national law to such seizure;

B.

The right not to apply the provisions of the first paragraph of s. 3 to the seizure in their territory as a result of the claims under para. Q of art. 1.

The High Contracting Parties undertake to submit to arbitration all disputes between States which may result from the interpretation or application of this Convention, without prejudice, however, to the obligations of the High Contracting Parties which Agreed to submit their disputes to the International Court of Justice.

This Convention shall be open for signature by the States represented at the Ninth Diplomatic Conference of Maritime Law. The minutes of signature will be drawn up by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Belgium.

This Convention shall be ratified and the instruments of ratification shall be deposited with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Belgium, which shall notify it of the deposit to all signatory and acceding States.

The present Convention shall enter into force between the first two States which have ratified it, six months after the date of the deposit of the second instrument of ratification.

B. For each signatory State ratifying the Convention after the second deposit, it shall enter into force six months after the date of the deposit of its instrument of ratification.

Any State not represented at the Ninth Diplomatic Conference of Maritime Law may accede to this Convention.

Accessions will be notified to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Belgium, which will notify all signatory and acceding states through diplomatic channels.

The Convention shall enter into force for the acceding State six months after the date of receipt of such notification, but not before the date of its entry into force as set out in Art. 14 A .

Any High Contracting Party may, at the expiration of the three-year period following the entry into force of this Convention, request the meeting of a Conference to decide on all proposals for the revision of The Convention.

Any High Contracting Party wishing to avail itself of this option will notify the Belgian Government which will convene the conference within six months.

Each of the High Contracting Parties shall have the right to denounce this Convention at any time after its entry into force. However, such denunciation shall take effect only one year after the date of receipt of the notification of termination to the Government of Belgium, which shall notify the other Contracting Parties through diplomatic channels.

A. Any High Contracting Party may, at the time of ratification, accession, or at any time thereafter, notify in writing to the Government of Belgium that this Convention applies to the territories or to certain territories to which it assures International relations. The Convention shall be applicable to the said Territories six months after the date of receipt of such notification by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Belgium, but not before the date of entry into force of this Convention in respect of that High Contracting Party.

B. Any High Contracting Party that has entered into a declaration under subs. He article may at any time notify the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Belgium that the Convention ceases to apply to the Territory in question. Such denunciation shall take effect within the one-year period laid down in Art. 17.

C. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Belgium shall, through diplomatic channels, notify all signatory States and members of any notification received by it under this Article.

Done at Brussels, on May 10, 1952, in the English and French languages, both texts being equally authentic.

(Suivent signatures)