Ukraine has officially opened a new page in the development of the military-industrial complex. Defence City is moment X for the Ukrainian Tech sector. This is a special legal and tax regime, which offers manufacturers of weapons and military technologies conditions that did not exist before on the global market. This is not just another initiative, but rather a strategic "virtual zone" (by analogy with the successful Diia.City) that will operate until 2036 or until the moment of joining the EU.
Mashchenko and Partners assisted the Client - a Ukrainian cargo owner importer of South African wine to obtain compensation from the Danish carrier - Maersk A/S for the cost of damaged/lost cargo of beverages, which was transported from the port of Cape Town to the port of Gdansk.
The incident occurred on August 07, 2024. During cargo operations in the port of Rotterdam, several containers were damaged, including those with wine belonging to the Client.
The case was complicated by the lack of cargo insurance, the limitation of the liability of the forwarder and carrier in accordance with the terms of contracts and international maritime law, and the expiration of the term for applying to court to recover compensation from the carrier.
We considered and evaluated options for recovering compensation for cargo damage from a Ukrainian forwarder, a Danish shipping carrier and a stevedoring company in Rotterdam.
Mashchenko & Partners together with colleagues from Rosling King LLP successfully completed the case in London arbitration in a dispute between the shipowner and the charterer.
The shipowner demanded compensation from the charterer for the time the vessel was waiting in the Turkish Straits for an inspection by the Joint Coordination Center, which worked within the framework of the Grain Initiative in 2023, the participants of which were Ukraine, russia, Turkey, under the auspices of the UN.
The vessel stood for almost a month waiting for the inspection, which never took place due to sabotage by representatives of the russian federation, who were part of the inspection teams, then the russian federation withdrew from the agreement and began missile attacks on Ukrainian Black Sea ports participating in the Initiative (Odesa, Chornomorsk and Pivdenny). As a result of the attacks, our Client’s grain cargo, for the transportation of which the vessel was chartered, was also damaged. The charterer was forced to abandon the carriage.
29 February 2024
MBLS provided legal advice to one of the world's largest specialized auctions for the sale of seized maritime assets (merchant vessels and yachts) regarding the procedure for obtaining the rights to sell the yacht Royal Romance, which is owned by an off-shore company of the family of former People's Deputy of Ukraine Viktor Medvedchuk, accused of treason in favour of russia. The Royal Romance yacht, built in 2015, 92 meters long, worth 200 million euros, is one of the most expensive in the world.
Royal Romance, registered in the Malaysian Yacht Registry (formerly the Cayman Islands), is currently under arrest in the Croatian port of Trogir and is to be handed over to a person legal entity selected on competitive basis by the National Agency of Ukraine for the Identification, Tracing and Management of Assets Derived from Corruption and Other Crimes (ARMA), for the arranging of the sale of a yacht on electronic bidding, according to the decision of the Croatian and Ukrainian courts.