Interlegal successfully defended the Indian shipowner’s interests

M/V “BON VENT” was chartered to deliver cargo from the Port of Nikolayev, Ukraine, to the one of the Port of Bender Abbas or Port of Bender Imam Khomeini, Iran.

Vessel was chartered to deliver cargo from the Port of Nikolayev, Ukraine, to the one of the Port of Bender Abbas or Port of Bender Imam Khomeini, Iran. The Owner stated that Charterer failed to pay freight, hence initiated arbitration proceedings, performed their right on cargo lien and on March 14, 2014, discharged the cargo at the port of Bender Imam Khomeini, Iran.

On April 11, 2014, the Charterers and the Consignee concluded the Settlement Agreement, which stipulated, that the lien on cargo was lawful. Despite the arrangements the Charterers sued and arrested the Vessel in the port of Yuzhny (Ukraine) on the basis of the investigative judge ruling as the instrument of crime commitment.

The Owners instructed INTERLEGAL to protect their and crewmember`s rights and interests in criminal proceeding and release the Vessel.

INTERLEGAL proved the absence of corpus delicti and grounds for the Vessel arrest, so it was cancelled. After that two consecutive arrests of the Vessel as itself and arrest of the ship`s documents on the basis of the investigative judge сrulings followed.

INTERLEGAL appealed against all the rulings and succeeded to cancel all of them in the Court of Appeal of Nikolayev region.

Ship owner’s interests were represented by Sergey Kalitenko and Alexey Remeslo, senior lawyers of Interlegal, under the general supervision of Artem Skorobogatov, associated partner.

Shipowner of MV «Bon Vent»: «I appreciate all of your entire team’s efforts and congratulations once again on this victory. It is indeed a big victory».