TÜRKIYE Law and Practice Contributed by: Türker Yıldırım, Semih Sander, Gülistan Baltacı Hatay and Selçuk Sencer Esenyel, Esenyel|Partners Lawyers & Consultants
There is no specific statutory time bar for filing mari - time claims before the Turkish courts per se. As a mat - ter of private international law, time bars are subject to the law that is applicable to the underlying legal relationship. The lapse of time leading to the extinction of maritime liens is governed by Article 1326 of the TCC, which is incorporated from Articles 6 and 9 of the 1993 MLM Convention. Maritime liens listed under Article 1320 (1) (a) to (e) are extinguished after one year unless, prior to expiry, the vessel is arrested or seized for a forced sale. For the seamen’s claims, the period of one year commences upon the claimant’s discharge from the vessel. 5.3 Liability in Personam for Owners or Demise Charterers Under Turkish law, as a general rule, in personam lia - bility of the owners or demise charterers is required for a vessel to be arrested. However, there is an exception for maritime liens. If the claim constitutes a recognised maritime lien, the vessel may be arrested regardless of whether the owners or demise charterers are per - sonally liable. 5.4 Unpaid Bunkers A bunker supplier may arrest a vessel based on a mar - itime claim, as provided under Article 1352 (1)(l) of the TCC. For an actual supplier to arrest the vessel, the supporting documents for the claim and the owner’s liability for the debt must be assessed separately. If the bunkers were supplied to a chartered vessel and ordered by the charterer rather than the owner, the vessel may not be arrested. However, since an arrest application is examined by Turkish courts on a prima facie basis, the owner’s or charterer’s liability is not always assessed in depth at this stage. Also, under Turkish law, a charterer does not have the authority to bind the vessel. 5.5 Arresting a Vessel The arresting party must provide prima facie evidence that the claim constitutes a maritime claim under Arti - cle 1352 of the TCC, including the amount claimed. Submission of original supporting documents is not required.
A legalised power of attorney (PoA) in favour of the lawyer is required. If the PoA is issued abroad, it would need to be notarised and apostilled. All documents in a foreign language must be trans - lated into Turkish by a translator recognised by a Turk - ish notary. Counter-Security Save for crew claims, the arresting party is required to provide counter-security at the fixed level of SDR10,000. Said security must be provided simulta - neously with the submission of the arrest application. The amount of the counter-security can be increased or decreased by the arresting court depending on the requests of the parties. 5.6 Arresting Bunkers and Freight There is no specific provision directly allowing the arrest of bunkers and freight. However, if the con - ditions set out under the general enforcement and attachment rules are met, it may be possible to obtain such an arrest. 5.7 Sister-Ship Arrest A sister-ship arrest is possible under TCC Article 1369 (2). This article is adopted from Article 3 (2) of the 1999 Arrest Convention. 5.8 Other Ways of Obtaining Attachment Orders Apart from vessel arrests, no other attachment orders are permitted on a vessel to secure maritime claims under TCC Article 1353. It is also not possible to arrest a vessel for claims other than maritime claims. How - ever, if the debtor owns assets other than the vessel and the legal requirements are met, attachment may be applied to such other assets. 5.9 Releasing an Arrested Vessel The arrested party can challenge the arrest order, and the latter can be lifted if the objections are accepted by the court. The release of the arrest vessel can be procured by provision of security. The amount of such secu - rity would be at the discretion of the arresting court, and is usually 115% of the claim amount, provided
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