The Study Of Pirates Ransom Insurance Liability

In recent years, the pirate issue is more and more rampant. The international community has realized that the pirate issue has induced serious threats to international shipping, maritime trade and maritime safety and it has become a major world-widely public hazard. Somalia is one of the active regions of pirate issue. The pirate usually takes hostages for ransom without injuring people or destroying ships, and most of the pirates-seize-ships events are eventually solved by paying ransom to the pirate. The consequences of the ransom demand are concern about the risks and losses shared by shippers and carriers. But in virtue of ransom's particularities, there are disputations on if the ransom still belongs to the traditional piracy category or scope of coverage. Massive discussions have been focused on how to share the huge expense in insurance industry. There should be long-run strategies in coping with the difficulty.This thesis uses methods of comparison, cases study and joint analysis of theory and practices, defining pirates ransom, analyzing related traditional regulations to conclude whether the pirates ransom could be covered by insurance compensation. It also makes suggestions on amending maritime insurance legislation and insurance contract items in order to settle issues of pirates ransom compensation under new situations.It is consisted of three parts, which are introduction, main body and conclusion.Chapter One is "Analysis on legal nature of pirate ransom",it firstly defines pirate action, admits that pirates ransom is a new form of pirate action; then discusses legal nature of pirates ransom and considers pirates ransom is general average.Chapter Two is "Insurance compensation clause of pirates ransom".Through studying on provisions of ship insurance clause and cargo insurance clause related to pirate risk, this chapter analyses on what conditions pirates ransom is in the scope of insurance coverage.Chapter Three is "The pirates ransom should be in the range of insurance indemnity".By analyzing rationality of insurance indemnity liability of pirates ransom and judicial practice, this chapter concludes that pirates ransom is in the scope of insurance indemnity.Chapter Four is "Modification suggestion on maritime insurance legislation and insurance contract items in China".After above analysis of pirates ransom and insurance indemnity study, this chapter suggests that pirate insurance should be established independently, protection and indemnity insurance should be introduced, rights and obligations between the insurer and the insured should be clearly defined, etc.,and gives some reasonable advice on maritime insurance legislation and insurance contract items.