Companía de Seguros Ecuatoriano Suiza SA, an insurance company acting under an assignment of rights, claimed for damage to cargo against Companía Maersk del Ecuador CA. The first instance Court admitted the claim. The defendant appealed, alleging that the claim was time-barred as the lawsuit was served after the one-year time bar established in art 3.6 of the Hague-Visby Rules, ratified by Ecuador. The Court of Appeal (CA) affirmed the decision stating that the claim had been filed in time. The defendant recurred the decision on cassation before the Supreme Court/Corte Nacional de Justicia (SC), alleging that the CA ignored the time bar provision of the Hague-Visby Rules.

Held: The SC affirmed the decision.

The SC acknowledged that art 3.6 of the Hague-Visby Rules establish that the carrier and the ship are released from all liability unless a lawsuit is filed within one year after delivery of the cargo. As the ship arrived on 19 March 2002, the lawsuit against the carrier should have been filed by 19 March 2003. Hence, a complaint served on 24 November 2003 would be time-barred. However, the SC stated that the plaintiff's claim was not for damage to cargo due to negligence, in which case the direct action of the injured party arising from the damage itself must be filed within one year. The claim of the plaintiff arises from an assignment of rights resulting from a payment made as an insurer. In this case, the time bar must be determined by the laws governing the insurance contract, which, in this regard, establishes a two-year time bar from the time when the claim arose. Hence, whether this period was counted from the time of the delivery of the cargo, or the time of the insurance payment, the service of process effected on 24 November 2003 was within the two-year limitation period. Therefore, the claim was filled on time.