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The Suez Canal crisis, triggered by the grounding of the Evergreen ship, has highlighted Egypt's strategic asset in global trade, as the canal handles approximately 30% of the world's shipping container volume. The incident led to significant economic implications, with estimated losses of $400 million per hour during the blockage, prompting legal actions and negotiations for compensation. Ultimately, an agreement was reached between the Suez Canal Authority and the ship's owners for a compensation package, allowing the ship to be released after extensive salvage efforts.

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0% found this document useful (0 votes)
4 views14 pages

3 RD

The Suez Canal crisis, triggered by the grounding of the Evergreen ship, has highlighted Egypt's strategic asset in global trade, as the canal handles approximately 30% of the world's shipping container volume. The incident led to significant economic implications, with estimated losses of $400 million per hour during the blockage, prompting legal actions and negotiations for compensation. Ultimately, an agreement was reached between the Suez Canal Authority and the ship's owners for a compensation package, allowing the ship to be released after extensive salvage efforts.

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© All Rights Reserved
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Suez Canal Authority Vs Evergreen matter

The Suez Canal crisis has created a national situation that Egypt has not experienced in decades. The Suez
Canal has once again become the subject of national dialogue, in a way that renewed the memories of
Egyptians about it and rediscovered one of their strategic assets of global standing.

The Suez Canal is a crucial shortcut between Asia and Europe that saves ships from having to navigate the
Cape of Good Hope around the southern tip of Africa which is a significantly longer journey, Roughly
30(thirty) per cent of the world’s shipping container volume transits through the 193(one hundred ninety-
three)km canal daily. ………………………………………………………………………………………

It is estimated that the costs to global trade is estimated to be about 400 (four hundred million US$) per hour
based on the approximate value of goods that are moved through the Suez every day, according to shipping
data and news company. (1)

Since it is not only Egypt but the whole world, because it has an impact on the movement of world trade,
The world around us has observed the disruption of the Suez Canal's traffic caused by the stranding of the
400 (four hundred )-meter-wide Panamanian ship "Evergreen," which lost control and drifting at 151(one
hundred fifty-one) kilos in the south convoy of the new Suez Canal, as they are one of the most active
waterways in the world on its journey from China to the port of Rotterdam in the Netherlands, the ship
blocked the route of other ships that were stuck in queues in both directions.

So in this article, we're going to try to look at the real causes of this incident and analyze them
thoroughly by taking up several points:……………………………………………………………………….

I. The incident’s involved actors/entities: their legal personality’s nature, nationality:

1- The Chairman of Suez Canal Authority in his capacity. (Egyptian authority) (2)

2- Owners (Shoei Kisen Kaisha, The company was founded on 5 April 1919 and is headquartered in
Tokyo, Japan). Tenants, Operators, and Processors of the Evergreen ship (Taiwanese container Line
Evergreen Marine, headquartered in Luzhu District, Taoyuan City, Taiwan.), the Flag of the State of
Panama, and all its stakeholders. (3)
3- Legal Representative of the Egyptian Authority for the Safety of Maritime Navigation in Suez in his
capacity, (Egyptian authority). (4)
4- Arabian Gulf Marine Trading Co. (Egyptian Co) - Navigator of the Evergreen River Line Chartered Ship
(Ever Given) Ever Given Flag Crane of the State of Panama. (5)
5- Treasures International Maritime Transport and Trade Co (Egyptian Co), Agent of Evergreen ship (6)
‫ـــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــ ــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــ ــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــ ـــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــ ــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــ ـــــــــــــــــــ‬
(1) [Link]
(2) Articles 1, 2, and 6 of Act No. 30 of 1975
(3) Article 80 of the Maritime Trade Act No. 8 of 1990
(4) Article 3 of Presidential Decree No. 399 of 2004
(5) Egyptian Transport Ministry resolution 425 of 2016
(6) Article 144 of the Maritime Trade Act No. 8 of 1990
II. Facts of the matter:

On 21 March 2021, the Naval Agent of the Evergreen ship named Evergreen, the flag crane of the State of
Panama, requested the said ship to cross the Suez Canal in the southern convoy.

On 23 March 2021, during the crossing of the Canal, the ship in question drifted into the Suez Canal
navigation route in one hundred fifty-one kilo, resulting in the closure of the Canal's navigation route and
the suspension of its full navigation until Monday 29 March 2021.

On 23 March 2021, the naval agent of the ship applied for employment to assist in floating and
towing the ship. ………….………………..…………………………………………………………………

On 25 March 2021, a report was made on the damage caused to the navigation system against the owners
and the master of the ship.

The Authority has carried out all its relevant departments to intervene to salvage and float the said ship using
all the equipment, machinery, cranes, and locomotives of the Authority.

Protest letters have been issued and kept with different dates for the owners and navigational authority of the
said ship by holding them fully responsible for all direct and indirect damage to the channel's navigational
route as a result of the ship's stranding.

The flotation and its release from the drifting took six days of continuous work to maintain the ship and the
goods loaded on it, which carried seventeen thousand six hundred eighty-five cargo containers and 540 (five
hundred forty) empty containers worth more than Two billion US$.

On 29 March 2021, the navigation was successfully reopened and the ship was successfully salvaged and
without a single container falling into the channel's navigational course, a unique operation since no ship had
ever been salvaged in this way without reducing its cargo and without losing part of the goods, as certified by
IMO and the international community. ……………………………………………………………………

To carry out this mission and salvage the ship (Evergreen) and the goods on which the
locomotives and garages of the Authority were exposed to serious dangers as well as the staff of the
Authority were exposed to serious dangers of equipment of the Authority and some human salvage staff
suffered physical injuries in causing serious damage and another death.

The total estimated value of the ship's flotation amounted to only 916,526.494 US$ (nine hundred and
sixteen million, five hundred and twenty-six thousand, four hundred and ninety-four dollars), which is
the value of direct and indirect damage to the requesting body as a result of the ship's drifting, which
consisted of the cost of using locomotives, and cranes used to float the ship and save it from the drifting.
The damage suffered by the Authority is the denial of income to the Suez Canal facility traffic stoppages
from 23 March 2021 AD to 29 March 2021, departure of ships, and non-transit, At the request of the SCA,
The President of the Ismailia Court of Primary Court in his capacity as the Ad hoc Judge, issued his order
No. 26 of 2021 orders of the Economic Court of Ismailia. The imposition of the arrest of The ship called
Evergreen is the flag crane of the State of Panama and its cargo, to ensure the fulfillment of a maritime claim
of only 916,526,494 US$ (Nine hundred and sixteen million and fifty-six thousand and four hundred and
ninety-four United States dollars).

On 13 April 2021, according to the above-mentioned order, Ismailia Court of First Instance
Execution bailiff ordered a transfer to the location of the Evergreen ship, which is located in the region of
the Bitter Lakes in Ismailia, and He has written a record of the signing of the arrest on the ship in question
and its cargo.

On 22 April 2021, the complainants, in their capacity as owners of the ship referred to in the write
grievance No. 12 of 2021, filed a court office to appeal against Order No. 26 of 2021 of 12 April 2021 on the
arrest of the ship Evergreen. ……………………………………………………………………

After reading the papers and hearing the case and the court ruled to reject the complaint and uphold order
no. 26 of 2021 issued on 21 April 2021, to the ship Evergreen.

This prompted the ship's owners to appeal the previous ruling to appeal no. 35 for a year 14 and a hearing
was scheduled for 22 May 2021, before the second appeals chamber.

At the session held publicly in the economic court of appeal on Sunday, 23 May 2021, after reading the
papers and hearing oral arguments, and deliberating legally, the court ruled after its qualitative jurisdiction to
hear the case and refer it to the Ismailia economic instance court for consideration at the session on 29 May
2021.

The Ismailia Court of First Instance decided on Saturday, 29 May 2021, to postpone the decision on
judicial case No. 78 of 2021, which was filed by the Suez Canal Authority to stabilize the Arrest signed on the
Evergreen ship, which drifted in the Suez Canal to the session of 20 June 2021 to end the negotiation at the
request of the applicants. …………………………………………………………………………….

The Ismailia Court of First Instance decided at the session on 20 June 2021, to postpone the session to 4 July
2021 to give the parties time to negotiate the dispute.

The Ismailia Court of First Instance decided at the session on 4 July 2021, to postpone the session to 11 July
2021 to complete the settlement at the request of the parties to the dispute based on their reaching a
preliminary agreement on compensation and an end to the dispute by amicable settlement.
The Egyptian Suez Canal Authority and the owners and insurers of the giant cargo ship Evergreen have
reached an agreement on the compensation that Egypt will receive for the damage caused by the ship's
stranding, And based on what's agreed upon, the Suez Canal Authority announced its intention to release the
ship held in the Bitter Lakes region of the Canal on Wednesday, 7 July 2021.

Earlier, the British Protection and Compensation Club (The UK Club), insured on the Evergreen, announced
that a final agreement had been reached with the Suez Canal Authority regarding the ship's stranding and that
preparations were underway for its release and sailing.

The Egyptian newspaper (Al-Shorouk) quoted sources described as informed, saying that this settlement
included the payment of the company for total compensation of 540,000.000 US$, part of which is paid in
cash, while its officials signed letters of guarantee to pay another part of the amount and within the amount
of compensation, the company will hand over Egypt, a new Japanese locomotive worth 70 million dollars, in
exchange for salvage and maintenance measures carried out by the crews of the Authority for the ship and
the costs of disrupting the traffic of the Suez Canal by the ship (1).

Finally, on Wednesday, 7 July 2021, the giant container ship Evergreen, which closed one of the world's most
important shipping lanes for days in March, was released and sailed after months of protracted legal
controversy over compensation between ship-owners, insurance companies, and Egyptian officials

Vice admiral Osama Rabie (Chairman of the Suez Canal Authority), said that non-disclosure of the amounts
of compensation had been agreed upon, but we assure the Egyptian people that the State has fully acquired
And he confirmed that we got the bulk of the its rights and found a satisfactory solution for all parties, -
amount due before the ship left, and within a month we'd get the second part.

III. Applicable law/ competent jurisdiction in case of judicial procedures engagement:

In accordance with international private law, the Egyptian judge, if the case is submitted to him contained
involving a foreign party, may examine whether there is a special law enacted in Egypt that deals with the
matter or whether there is an international treaty in force in Egypt, It applies the provisions of the treaty
without the conflict clauses of articles 10 to 22 of the Civil Code, The Brussels Convention of 1952 and the
Egyptian Maritime Trade Act was applied concerning the validity of the ship's reservation procedures to meet
the maritime claim. The Economic Court of Ismailia specialized in hearing the case, because it is the court that
took place in its arrest department and this is what makes us wonder whether arbitration has a role in this case.

From this perspective, The Suez Canal Authority is a public body with independent legal personality subject to
the provisions of this law alone.
___________________________________________________________________________________
(1) [Link] -5308-4260-be42-
a5f20e646711&fbclid=IwAR0YoEXukjQMD2b88WJdXKPBl9tX8iqz70VkIzvj24AW_EOmeKMcaxcjPEI
In the same regard, Article 7 of the International Convention Relating to the Arrest of Sea-Going Ships in
Brussels on 10 May 1952:

(1) The Courts of the country in which the arrest was made shall have jurisdiction to determine the case upon
its merits if the domestic law of the country in which the arrest is made gives jurisdiction to such Courts or in
any of the following cases namely:

(a) If the claimant has his habitual residence or principal place of business in the country in which the arrest
was made;

(c) If the claim concerns the voyage of the ship during which the arrest was made;

(d) If the claim arose out of a collision or in circumstances covered by article 13 of the International
Convention for the unification of certain rules of law with respect to collisions between ships, signed at
Brussels on 23rd September 1910;

(e) If the claim is for salvage;

(f) If the claim is upon a mortgage or hypothecation of the ship arrested.

(2) If the Court within whose jurisdiction the ship was arrested has not jurisdiction to decide upon the merits,
the bail or other security given in accordance with article 5 to procure the release of the ship shall specifically
provide that it is given as security for the satisfaction of any judgment which may eventually be pronounced
by a Court having jurisdiction so to decide; and the Court or other appropriate judicial authority of the
country in which the claimant shall bring an action before a Court having such jurisdiction.

(3) If the parties have agreed to submit the dispute to the jurisdiction of a particular Court other than that
within whose jurisdiction the arrest was made or to arbitration, the Court or other appropriate judicial
authority within whose jurisdiction the arrest was made may fix the time within which the claimant shall
bring proceedings.

(4) If, in any of the cases mentioned in the two preceding paragraphs, the action or proceeding is not brought
within the time so fixed, the defendant may apply for the release of the ship or of the bail or other security.

(5) This article shall not apply in cases covered by the provisions of the revised Rhine Navigation Convention
of 17 October 1868.

In the same context, Article 8 of the International Convention Relating to the Arrest of Sea-Going Ships in
Brussels on 10 May 1952:

(1) The provisions of this Convention shall apply to any ship flying the flag of a Contracting State in the
jurisdiction of any Contracting State.
(2) A ship flying the flag of a non-Contracting State may be arrested in the jurisdiction of any Contracting
State in respect of any of the maritime claims enumerated in article 1 or of any other claim for which the law
of the Contracting State permits arrest.

(3) Nevertheless any Contracting State shall be entitled wholly or partly to exclude from the benefits of this
convention any government of a non-Contracting State or any person who has not, at the time of the arrest,
his habitual residence or principal place of business in one of the Contracting States.

(4) Nothing in this Convention shall modify or affect the rules of law in force in the respective Contracting
States relating to the arrest of any ship within the jurisdiction of the State of her flag by a person who has his
habitual residence or principal place of business in that State.

(5) When a maritime claim is asserted by a third party other than the original claimant, whether by
subrogation, assignment or other-wise, such third party shall, for the purpose of this Convention, be deemed
to have the same habitual residence or principal place of business as the original claimant.

In accordance with what has been said, any agreement that impairs the jurisdiction of a foreign court or
arbitration outside the Arab Republic of Egypt in cases arising out of the salvage shall be invalid, this is if the
salvage occurs in Egyptian waters and the ship that carried out the salvage or the ship that have been
salvaged had Egyptian nationality. (1)

Also, Article 21 of Egyptian Civil Code: “Non-contractual obligations are governed by the law of the State in
whose territory the act that gave rise to the obligation took place.”

IV. Arbitration vs. litigation: SCA -Suez Canal Authority- ‘s Internal Regulation, related laws
as it is an Independent Public Authority and the State of Egypt represented by its Cabinet
will be involved or not in case of judicial procedures?

As the Economic Court decided to postpone the case until July 4 to give the parties a negotiating time to
resolve the dispute, And this is the second time the court has adjourned the case for the same reason, which
opens the way for us to think about the situation in which the dispute has not been resolved.

For our part, we believe that the SCA has two options: to settle the dispute in the courtroom or to transfer
the matter to arbitration. Each process has its advantages and disadvantages that must be carefully considered
before determining the path to be followed.

____________________________________________________________________________________
(1) Article 316 of Act No. 8 of 1990 “Maritime Law”.
The beginning of what distinguishes maritime arbitration from internal jurisdiction is the speed with which
maritime disputes are adjudicated and facilitated arbitration proceedings and prior consent of the parties to
be bound by its judgment and to act on it.

And applying article 316 of the Maritime Trade law, we will find that the Egyptian judiciary has the original
jurisdiction in this case because it happened in Egyptian territory.

It should be noted that the decision of the Suez Channel to resort to international arbitration courts is not a
decision unique to the Commission alone, but in accordance with Prime Minister's Decision No. 9592 of
2020, which decided to set up a cabinet committee called Cabinet. "The Supreme Court of Arbitration and
International Disputes," which is competent to study and give an opinion of all arbitral cases to which the
State is a member of public ministries and bodies and to which the Government and its subsidiary bodies or
companies, or to which they contribute in any way, are parties.

According to article 6 of the same resolution, "None of the administrative bodies, including ministries, public
bodies, government agencies, affiliates, or state-owned companies or contributing to them in any way, may
take any of the following measures without presenting them to the committee.
1-....................... 2- Take any measure or action concerning any arbitration dispute" (1)

V. The legal connection between both actors-SCA and Evergreen- the passage in the canal
legal act/material fact? Fees of Canal passage is it a passage contract/fact?

The Suez Canal is an artificial waterway in Egypt that allows ships to cross in two directions at the same time
between Europe and Asia, and is the fastest waterway between the two continents.

The Suez Canal is an international waterway, and vessels passing through the passage pass through
according to a transit system that the Suez Canal Authority and the Egyptian state alone put, before crossing,
ships have the right to access this legal system and then have the right to accept or refuse.

According to article 1 of the Decree of the President of the Arab Republic of Egypt by law No. 30 of 1975,
The Suez Canal Authority shall manage, use, maintain and improve the Suez Canal, its management, and
exploitation, The Suez Canal organized its relationship with ships that want to cross the canal wi thin the
navigation rules of the Suez Canal in article 12, which stipulated in the first paragraph that “Vessels may
book for transiting the Canal. The booking notice shall reach the Suez Canal Port Offices not later than four
days prior to the transit It must contain the name, date and nationality of the vessel, her type (Container,
RoRo, .... etc.), her particulars such as draught, length overall, beam, SC.G.T., SC.N.T. and D.W.T. ... etc.”

______________________________________________________________________________________
(1) [Link]
Also, what was mentioned in articles 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, which organized the transiting of vessels, As well as
article 88 of the same rules that included the transit system and its conditions until the ship passes.

Based on the above, the characterization of the relationship between the Suez Canal Authority and passing
ships is the "Contract of providing maritime passing services", which is originally a consensual agreement
between the parties, so, as the Suez Canal Authority is responsible for managing the International Maritime
Corridor (Suez Canal), it has the right to estimate the fees in accordance with the mechanisms of international
trade and the International Trade Organization on other international parties, whether vessels, maritime
carriers or even military carriers, This is reflected in article 6 of Act No. 30 of 1975, which stipulates that: "The
SCA, by itself and by no one else, shall issue and keep in force the rules of navigation in the Canal and other
rules and regulations that provide for a well and orderly run canal”.

The Suez Canal Authority has organized the rules for estimating canal fees, docking and pilotage fees, as well
as locomotive fees in addition to various additional dues, in articles 100, 101, 102, 103, 104, 105, 106, 107 of
the navigation rules of the Suez Canal.

Finally, the Suez Channel is subject to the observers of United Nations International Corridors monitors, and
the movement of its traders to the International Trade Organization.

VI. Legal Liabilities:

In the context of the reasons for blockage, there were many reasons for the ship’s stranding in the navigation
course of the Suez Canal, and despite the multiplicity of reasons, I turn to the view that the cause of the
ship’s stranding cannot be simple, But it is a complex cause of technical failure, which in turn led to The
Captain's Inability to fully control the ship, helped by the poor weather factors that led to the complete
standing resulting in the closure of the canal.

In this context, I believe that it cannot be said that the weather factors were the main cause of blockage as
some said, because according to the statement issued by the SCA in its press conference showed that there
are approximately (twelve) container ships that crossed the Channel on the same day under the same
circumstances, and none of them have been stranding as well, I believe that it cannot be said that the
technical failure were the main cause of blockage as some foreign press called, and so on. Because it is
unimaginable that a sudden failure solved one of the ship's engines cannot be controlled, and it entails the
ship stranding completely and drifting as it happened, where in such cases - engine failure - there are
alternative means of resolving the failure.

Finally, it cannot be said that the human error - the captain’s fault - is the main factor of blockage, because
according to the statement issued by the General Authority of the Suez Canal after preliminary examinations
and investigations, it also found that a technical failure contributed to the ship’s stranding, in addition to the
air worker finished the above, that a technical failure of the ship led to the inability of the captain to fully
control the command under the weather conditions The accompanying bad, resulting in the ship’s stranding
and derailment in the canal.

In the context of the legal responsibilities arising from the ship’s stranding, I will discuss the legal
responsibility for each of the reasons presented on the scene and the legal basis, and then the legal
responsibility for the reason I see from my point of view and its legal basis.

At first we will display elements of responsibility and this tort, damage, and causal relationship. Accordingly,
the tort here is that the ship’s stranding in the Suez Canal navigational course resulting from a technical
failure that in turn led to the captain's inability to fully control the ship's command, accompanied by poor
weather factors that led to the complete standing and the closure of the navigation course for 6 consecutive
days. The damage is the damage to the canal's navigational course (material damage and moral damage), as
well as damage to other ships stuck in the canal, as well as ships that veered off course, taking the cape of
good hope as well as the damage to the shipper, and the causal relationship is the ship’s stranding in the Suez
Canal navigational course.

Accordingly, the owner is responsible for the ship’s stranding in the Suez Canal navigational course. And the
resulting damage (Articles 81, 82 and 83 of Maritime Law).

Liability for the delay in delivering goods due to delay of Delinquent ship in the Suez navigation course is the
carrier's responsibility vis-à-vis the shipper, where the carrier is asked about the delay in delivering the goods.
In this case, the carrier may, if it proves that the delay is due to a foreign cause, the owner must pay
compensation (Article 240 of Maritime Law).

In this regard, The legal position now of the Suez Canal Authority in the face of the "company owning the
ship" and not the company " Evergreen " as the latter is a trading company and therefore is not fully
responsible for paying any compensation to the Suez Canal Authority the compensation is located here on
the Japanese company Shoei Kisen, which owns the ship, which is responsible for the ship's operating crew
of the owner or its maintenance and technical procedures.

"Our company is not responsible in the least," said Eric Hsieh, president of Evergreen Marine. He pinned
responsibility for compensation on the ship's Japanese owner, Shoei Kisen. Evergreen Marine chartered the
ship.

"The accident occurred during the transport, and during such circumstances, the ship's owner contractually
shoulders the responsibility," Hsieh said at a news briefing in Taipei. "Our company is only responsible for
the cargo itself, and it is covered by the insurance company. (1)

____________________________________________________________________________________
(1) [Link]
Also, the legal responsibility here is to face the insurance authority to provide the so-called "liability to the
third party" where it covers the costs that may result from the damage and Suffering of any individual or
company not covered by any contract with the owner of the ship (Suez Canal Authority) as a result of an
error committed by the owner of the ship, We understand that the ship grounded due to strong winds as it
was transiting (with two canal pilots onboard) northbound through the canal en route to Rotterdam,
Netherlands. (1)

During the blockage, Evergreen, on the other hand, hinted that the fault lies with the two Egyptian canal
pilots who boarded the ship for guidance. As a result, the question of SCA's Potential liability arises if it is
proven that the block was caused by a mistake on the part of SCA's pilot is raised.

The Navigation Rule provides in this respect that ships’ owners, charterers, and operators are responsible for
any mistakes resulting from pilot’s advice or arise from SCA’s personnel.(2)

It further provides that captains are solely responsible for all damages or accidents of whatever kind resulting
from the navigation or handling of their ships directly or indirectly. Pilots are not held responsible for any
damage incurred during the transit owing to its advice since the ship’s captain is the sole responsible for the
ship (Article 11 – A).

The Egyptian Commercial Maritime Law No. 8 for 1990 (“Maritime Law”) also made the ship’s owner
responsible for the acts of the ship’s captain, sailors, pilots, and any other person in the service of the ship
(Article 80), and that the ship’s owner is solely liable for damage incurred to third parties as a result of the
mistakes committed by the pilots during carrying out their job (3).

In reply to a challenge against the relevant articles of the Maritime Law, the Egyptian High Constitutional
Court explained in a judgment in 2010 that holding the ship’s owner liable for the mistakes of SCA’s pilots is
rational and does not violate the principle of equality or the general rules of liability of the employer for the
acts of its employees. The court explained that
The SCA’s pilots while guiding the ships to pass through the Suez Canal waterway act for the benefit of the
ship and become subordinate to the ship’s captain. The ship therefore should be liable for the pilots’ acts
even if they are hired by the SCA.

Also, According to the Navigation Rules, ships passing through the Canal will indemnify SCA in respect of
any claim against the latter for damage caused directly or indirectly by the ship to a third party.

Lastly, And talking about any compensation in the face of the Suez Canal Authority through "legal
international obligation" is a talk that has no legal connection, but rather the compensation
falls on the company that owns the ship in the face of the Suez Canal Authority and the third party (others).
____________________________________________________________________________________
(1) [Link]
(2) (Article 4.7 of Rules of Navigation )
(3) (Article 287 of Rules of Navigation )
VII. Compensation claims by SCA to repair damages resulting of the Canal blockage for 6
consecutive days, financial loss:

The total amount of compensation claimed by the SCA amounted to 916,526,494 US$, which is the value of
direct and indirect damage to the Suez Canal Authority as a result of the blockage of the canal for 6
consecutive days, as well as expenses incurred during the flotation of the ship “Evergreen”, and the
equipment it used during flotation and salvage.
Statement of the total incurred by the Suez Canal Authority As follows:
1- 272,333.621 US$ total costs of dredging and flotation.
2- 300,000.000 US$ salvage reward.
3- 344,192.873 US$ Total losses of the Suez Canal navigational course, which includes material and
moral losses.

With a total amount of 916,526494 US$ only (nine hundred and twenty-six million, five hundred and twenty-
six thousand, and four hundred and ninety-four dollars), this is in accordance with the provisions of Maritime
law (Articles 313, 326), and Article 39 of Law No. 8 for 1990.
On the other hand, these demands were not welcomed by the ship's owners, who considered it to be a largely
exaggerated amount.

It is worth mentioning that The Evergreen is finally floating again in the Suez Canal according to settlement
was reached between the SCA and the ship’s owners, but the compensation provided to the Suez Canal
Commission was not announced based on the non-disclosure agreement.

VIII. The legal grounds and the impacts of the Egyptian government seizure of Evergreen
ship:

The ship may be seized by order of the President of the competent court of the first instance or by the
person acting in his place, and the arrest may be ordered even if the ship is ready to travel.(1)

An arrest shall only be made in fulfillment of a debt maritime and, if it arises from one of the following
reasons, the debt shall be deemed to be maritime:
One of these reasons:
1- Damage caused by the ship due to collision, pollution or other similar maritime accidents.
2- Salvage. 3- Towage (2).

Anyone who maintains one of the debts mentioned in the preceding article may arrest the ship to which the
debt relates or any other ship to which the debtor owns if it was owned by him at the time the debt arose (3).
____________________________________________________________________________________
(1) Article 59 of Act No. 8 of 1990 “Maritime Law”.
(2) Article 60 of Act No. 8 of 1990 “Maritime Law”.
(3) Article 61 of Act No. 8 of 1990 “Maritime Law”.
Article 316 of procedural law provides that "the creditor may place a arrest on a debtor's movables in the
following circumstances:
1- ………….. 2- In every case where there is a fear of loss of security for the creditor, “the security is
intended to be the creditor's general security over debtor funds, Fear is the fear that the creditor will
lose this security due to specific circumstances and the burden of proof is on the creditor” (1)

Article 2 of the International Convention Relating to the Arrest of Sea-Going Ships in Brussels on 10 May
1952, and approved by Egypt under Act No. 135 of 1955 “A ship flying the flag of one of the Contracting
States may be arrested in the jurisdiction of any of the Contracting States in respect of any maritime claim,”

As provided in Article 3, paragraph 1, and in the fourth paragraph of the same article that each creditor may
have a maritime claim related to the ship to impose the arrest in order to guarantee his debt whether the
owner at the time of its creation is the owner, tenant or any other person, if the owner of this debt is the
owner, the creditor may also arrest any other ship owned by the same owner other than the one in which
the debt is attached, But if the official is the tenant of the ship and its navigational management is
transferred to him, his creditor may, as well as the imposition the arrest of the ship to which the debt is
attached, also impose it on any other ship owned by the same tenant, and in all cases where any person
other than the owner of the ship is responsible for a maritime claim and if the same ship to which the
marine debt is held may be reserved for him, it is not permissible to reserve under this debt any other ship
of the owner. They believe that the use of the right to sign an arrest on the ship is not linked to the claim of
fulfilling the right and that such detention has no purpose other than to stop the ship until a guarantee is
Obtained to meet the debt and is not based on the original order except on the ship to which the debt is
attached (2).

IX. Maritime law, insurance law, international private law perspectives.

Based on the above, we explained Maritime law, and international private law perspectives about Evergreen
matter, so we're going to talk here about Maritime law perspective for certain third party liabilities that
might arise from an incident such as this, and Cargo Insurance.

At the outset, the legal responsibility here is to face the insurance authority to provide the so-called "liability
to the third party" where it covers the costs that may result from the damage and Suffering of any individual
or company not covered by any contract with the owner of the ship (Suez Canal Authority) as a result of an
error committed by the owner of the ship. Based on that, The UK Club has insured the owner of “Ever
Given” for certain third-party liabilities that might arise from an incident such as this.(3)

__________________________________________________________________________________
(1) Appeal No. 806 (judicial year 45, session of 6 April 1978)
(2) Appeal No. 1454 (judicial year 55, session of 28 December 1992)
(3) [Link]
Furthermore, the effect on the global supply chain due to the incident will also result in insurance claims.
The claims will not come only from cargo on board the Ever Given but from cargoes on ships which
voyage will be delayed due to inability to transit the Canal, Most Cargo Insurance policies adopt the Institute
Cargo Clauses issued by the Institute of London Underwriters Wordings. These wordings adopt the choice
of English law and Practice, Thus the terms of the UK Marine Insurance Act 1906 will apply. Most of these
policies are of the all risks type, and delay is excluded.

Also, the Carriage of the containers by the vessel Ever Given is regulated by the bills of lading issued by
Evergreen. For cargoes loaded at the Port of Tanjung Pelepas, Johor Malaysia, the terms of the bill of lading
will attract the application of the Hague Rules as applied by the Malaysian Carriage of Goods by Sea Act.(1).

In conclusion:
And based on the above, we’ve tried to stand on several important points to illustrate the big picture of the
SCA and Evergreen issue, at the outset, we explained the parties involved in the incident and the
relationship between them, as well as their nationality, Also, The facts relating to the crisis from the time of
the ship's delinquency to the salvage of ship Evergreen, Till the ship released and sailed after months of
protracted legal controversy over compensation between ship-owners, insurance companies, and Egyptian
officials, As well as clarifying the applicable law and the legal jurisdiction in this dispute which was for the
Egyptian judiciary, And naturally, we tried to clarify the legal relationship between the Suez Canal and the
ship on the other hand and to adapt the legal relationship between them which we think is closer to
a contract of providing maritime passing services", which is originally a consensual agreement between the
parties, As well as the legal grounds on which it was based from local laws and International Conventions
and in the end we tried to clarify Maritime law, insurance law, international private law perspectives for SCA
and Evergreen matter.

__________________________________________________________________________________
(1) [Link]
Information about the authors:

Name: Ibrahim Nagah Mohamed


University: Tanta University English Department
Email: ibrahimnagah771@[Link]
Phone number: 01060966755
The author’s background: I graduated from the Tanta University Faculty of Law, earned a
master's degree in public law, and was a junior lawyer for two years, focusing my practice on civil
litigation.
__________________________________________________________________________________

Name: Asmaa Magdi Abdelazem


University: Al-azhar University
Email: asmaamagdy132@[Link]
Phone number: 01125782710
The author’s background: I have been working as a corporate & litigation lawyer for 4 years -
have a Diploma in private-criminal law.

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