Multimodal Transport Operators' Liability Regimes under the UN Multimodal Transport Convention 1980 and UNCTAD / ICC Rules 1992 - A Comparative Perspective

With the development of international multimodal transports, the liability of multimodal transport operators (MTOs) has been a crisis drawing concerns of parties in international multimodal transport contracts (MT contracts). There have been attempts to create a global uniform regime governing the liability of MTOs such as the UN multimodal transport convention 1980 (MT convention) and UNCTAD/ICC Rules for multimodal transport documents 1992 (UNCTAD/ICC rules). However, none of these regimes have a mandatory effect. Even so, these regimes have significantly impacted on regional and national regulations on multimodal transport such as the ASEAN framework agreement on Multimodal transport or Mexico's ?DiarioOficial'. Especially, the UNCTAD/ICC rules have been widely accepted in commercial practice. This is proven by the incorporation of the Rules into Multimodal transport documents such as the FIATA bill of lading 1992 and BIMCO's Multidoc95. Therefore, to explore the advantages and disadvantages of the liability provisions as well as understand the failure, this paper will discuss comparatively liability regimes for MTOs who are involved in sea carriage of goods under the MT convention and UNCTAD/ICC rules. Particularly, the regulations related to the scope of liability, limitation and the time bar will be analysed and critically examined in this paper.