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New Road Carriers' Liability Regime in Croatia and Lessons from the Old Normative Anomalies for the Neighbouring Countries

After a long period of hesitation, Croatia finally became a party to the 1978 CMR-SDR Protocol, which entered into force for Croatia on 1 May 2017. However, some of the neighbouring countries in South East Europe have still not ratified this old but important Protocol, thus creating a very dangerous normative regime for the road freight carrier and a dichotomy in the application of the CMR convention. This normative anomaly existed in Croatia until 1 May 2017, and still exists in Serbia, Montenegro and Bosnia and Herzegovina, with the consequence that, whenever the law of those states is applied to a case, the limitation of the carrier’s liability is to be calculated in Gérminal francs (GFs), instead of the generally accepted special drawing rights (SDRs). Owing to the fact that the value of GFs is related to the price of gold, the limitation arises to approximately 2000 per cent higher amount compared to that calculated from the SDRs. The contractual limitations in the professional liability insurance policies available on the market are either linked to the CMR-SDR Protocol 1978 limitations in SDRs, or expressed in fixed sums much lower that the limits calculated in GFs. As a consequence, without the SDR-CMR Protocol, the carrier remains solely liable for the excess of damages between the policy limit and the limitation in GFs. This article shows the importance of the ratification of the CMR-SDR Protocol 1978 for the remaining states not parties to it on the example of Croatia and its case law that has, over the years, adopted the calculation of limitation of liability in GFs, with detrimental consequences for the road carriers. This practice will have to be amended, and the limitation of liability in SDRs will have to be applied in Croatia on all cases that occurred after 1 May, 2017. Hopefully, the lessons will also be learned for other countries in the region.

CMR-SDR Protocol, liability of the carrier, limitation of liability, Germinal Franc

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