An AIDA Presidential Council meeting will coincide with the AIDA World Congress in Rome in September.

Meetings to finalise World Congress arrangements were on May 7-10 in Athens.

The meetings considered several important issues:

• More amendments to the by-laws, including considering expanding the number of vice-presidents because of AIDA’s increasing workload;
• An extensive report by Tim Hardy who analysed responses to a survey of national chapters;
• Presidential Council member reports; and
• The selection of office bearers for 2014 to 2018.

For the World Congress’s major themes and topics, the current totals for national responses are transparency, conflicts of interest and intermediary remuneration – 34, arbitration – 32, discrimination in insurance – 26, online insurance – 24, and preventive measures – 23.

All working parties will meet in Rome. Some are well advanced in their preparations, including identifying specific topics and speakers. For example:

 

Marine

General topic: Preventive measures

Themes for discussion:

• Costs of searching for lost anchors: hull or P&I?
• Costs of removing lost cargo: cargo, P&I or neither, because costs were incurred to avoid criminal liability?
• Whether the subsidiarity rule in P&I prevents recovery of sue and labour from P&I if the same act avoids H&M and P&I damage
• Whether sue and labour require the primary intention, co-intention or no intention to save insured property
• Costs of sacrificing insured property to prevent further loss (such as oil pollution or piracy ransom fees)

 

Speakers

• Professor Avv Giuseppina Capaldo, Sapienza University of Rome, Italy
• Dr Ozlem Gurses, senior lecturer, University of Southampton, UK
• Dr Maxmilian Guth, Dabelstein & Passehl, Germany
• Rodrigo Hayvard, legal & compliance, Zurich Insurance Group, Chile
• Professor Satoshi Nakaide, Waseda University, Japan

 

State supervision of insurance

Topics:

• Insurance mediation directive II
• Cross-border intermediation rules and barriers
• Claims distribution and management

 

Accumulation of claims and subrogation

Topic:

• The eventual reinsurer subrogation in property damage insurance

Click here to register for the World Congress in Rome.

Over the past few months, several events have occurred in the Asia-Pacific region that  have encouraged interest in international insurance law and the formation of national AIDA chapters. 

Chris Rodd has continued his efforts in India and Malaysia. Although things have moved slowly, they are promising. I understand an Indian association has been formed, but has not yet applied for AIDA membership.

In mid-May, I met the Thailand Insurance Institute president. In April, I worked with Bridges across Borders South-East Asia in Vietnam. I presented on ethics and access to justice, and did pro bono work at Can Tho, Ho Chi Minh City and Hanoi universities.

I met an academic in Ho Chi Minh City who was particularly interested in insurance law and keen to develop it in Vietnam. She sought assistance and has been in contact with Professor Marcel Fontaine, Professor Robert Merkin, Christopher Rodd and Greg Pynt.

Her reaction and gratitude are very good demonstrations of what the corporate resources of an international body like AIDA can mean for the development of good legal systems in countries that need some help.

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