Barzelex Inc v The MV ‘Ebn Al Waleed’ and Ors - Federal Ct (Trial Div)(Hugessen J) - 29 November 1999

Carriage of Goods by Sea - Package limitation - Method of enactment of Hague Rules in Turkey

This was the trial of preliminary issues, including how and in what manner the Hague Rules were in force in Turkey. It appeared that Turkey had enacted the Hague Rules twice into its legislation. Initially, on 14 February 1955, the Turkish Parliament ratified and enacted the Hague Rules in the same form as the latter had been adopted by the Brussels Convention of 1925. However, in 1956 the Turkish Parliament adopted the Turkish Commercial Code, which was a translation of the German Commercial Code of 1937. The latter code contained an adaptation of the substance of the Hague Rules. The original, 1955, enactment of the Hague Rules was never repealed, with the result that Turkish national law now apparently contained both a textual adoption of the Hague Rules and a national adaptation thereof as permitted by the Protocol of Signature. Article 1114 of the Turkish Commercial code enacted that where the nature and value of the goods had not been declared and inserted into the bill of lading the maximum liability of the carrier was 1,500 Turkish lire per package or unit. The Commercial Code was later amended in 1983, and the amount of such limitation was increased to 100,000 Turkish lire.