This was an appeal in cassation against the judgment of the Papeete Court of Appeal, 18 January 1995. Marigny & Co (Marigny), the shipping agent for Southern Oceans Container Lines (SOCL), obtained from the President of the Papeete Mixed Commercial Court an authorisation to seize the vessel Baltimar Taurus, belonging to K/S UL Taurus Ltd (Taurus), as security for the recovery of a debt owed to Marigny by SOCL, the charterer of the seized ship, which was valued by the Judge at XPF 8 million.

Taurus applied for the arrest to be lifted, but this was refused. Taurus appealed on the basis that the arrest was irregular under the laws of French Polynesia. Taurus further argued that only claims having one of the causes exhaustively listed in art 1 of the Arrest Convention 1952 can justify the protective seizure of a ship. However, the Court of Appeal affirmed that this condition was met in this case without indicating the cause of the debt invoked by Marigny. Moreover, the creditor of the charterer of a vessel may not arrest this vessel after the end of the charterparty, except by virtue of a claim relating to this vessel and arising during the time when it was chartered by demise. By simply stating that the arrest of the vessel to which the claim relates is possible, even if its owner is not the debtor, without specifying either the subject-matter of Marigny's claim or when it arose, the Court of Appeal deprived its decision of a legal basis under art 3 of the Arrest Convention 1952.

Held: Appeal dismissed.

The Decree conferring jurisdiction on the President of the Commercial Court to authorise the protective seizure of ships is applicable in overseas French territories. The Court of Appeal correctly upheld the competence of the President of the Mixed Commercial Court of Papeete.

Taurus, which was able to explain itself during the adversarial procedure having followed the authorisation to arrest the ship, does not allege that the omission of certain matters in its submissions would have undermined certain of its interests. Taurus did not contest Marigny's allegation that the debt, the cause of the arrest, represented disbursements made by the shipping agent on behalf of the ship, or that the claim referred to in art 1.1.n of the Arrest Convention 1952. Taurus did not dispute either that the Baltimar Taurus was the ship to which the debt related, and that the claim arose before the termination of the charter contract.