This Report on Maritime Trials in 2012 Issued by Guangzhou Maritime Court was publicized on 7 March, 2013 in the press conference presided over by Mr. Zhong Jianping, President of Guangzhou Maritime Court.

Over the last year, the maritime trials handled by Guangzhou Maritime Court have shown a good momentum of “three increases and one decrease”: Throughout 2012, the number of new cases heard by this Court totaled 2525, witnessing a year-on-year increase of 79.08%; the number of cases closed rose by 111.12% on a year-on-year basis, totaling 2582. The case settlement rate is 89.25%, which is a 12.38% increase over last year. The number of unsettled cases totaled 311, which is a 15.48% decrease over last year.

Maritime cases heard by this Court in 2012 were found to have the following three characteristics: First, the number of new cases increased substantially. The number of new cases heard by this Court in 2012 hit a historical high since the foundation of this Court in 1984. Cases that increased substantially include: disputes over labor contracts of the crewmembers (with a year-on-year increase of 27 times), disputes over contract of leasing containers (with a year-on-year increase of 20 times), disputes over contracts related to ships (with a year-on-year increase of 2.6 times) and the cases of application for registration of maritime claims witnessed an increase of 6.5 times.

Second, the public credibility of maritime court was enhanced to a new level. Guangzhou Maritime Court attached great importance to protection of legitimate rights and interests of equal parties to maritime cases, which resulted in the fact that more and more disputes have been submitted voluntarily to the jurisdiction of Guangzhou Maritime Court. Among cases of the first instance in 2012, parties involved in a total of 15 cases agreed to be submitted to the jurisdiction of this Court; one or both parties to 4 cases among them were foreign enterprises.

Third, new measures were taken to promote transparency of judicial proceedings. Information technologies were adopted to maintain synchronous audio and video recording of trial activities in court and to make live webcast of such activities available on a regular basis. A remote video system was built to allow parties or witnesses to attend remote video court hearings held in Guangzhou Maritime Court or its four tribunals separately at the same time. An electrical archival database was finally put in place to record closed cases for examination and supervision by parties involved (excluding those of confidential nature). In addition, to enhance judicial transparency, methods of internationalization were also applied by inviting over 40 representatives from Hong Kong shipping industry, insurance and logistics business to attend court sessions of Guangzhou Maritime Court and allowing them to get a vivid picture of maritime procedures of China.

The press conference was attended by over 40 people, among whom were judges of Guangzhou Maritime Court, maritime law experts and scholars, as well as press journalists.