Arthur Dedels October 1, 2026 The Strait of Hormuz has become a stark reminder that geopolitical risk can quickly become contractual risk for the shipping industry. A dangerous route does not however, by itself, determine whether an owner may refuse to proceed, whether a charterer has breached the charterparty, or who bears the resulting costs. Those questions depend on the particular contractual regime. BIMCO’s updated VOYWAR 2025 and CONWARTIME 2025 clauses were approved on 9 April 2025. They were updated against the background of recent conflicts, particularly the war in Ukraine and attacks on commercial shipping in the Red Sea. BIMCO recommends that members using the 2013 or earlier versions replace them with the 2025 versions. More recently, BIMCO has urged owners and charterers, in light of security concerns in the Gulf and surrounding waters, to review their existing and future charterparty terms. The distinction between voyage and time charters matters because, although both clauses protect against specified war risks, the contractual mechanisms differ. VOYWAR 2025 operates in the context of a defined voyage and, in specified circumstances, allows owners to decline to proceed, request the charterers to nominate a safe alternative port, or elect an alternative route. It also provides mechanisms for adjusting freight following a change to the voyage. CONWARTIME 2025 operates in the context of a time charter, where charterers ordinarily direct the vessel’s employment. It provides that the vessel is not required to proceed to or through an area where, in the reasonable judgment of the master or owners, it may be exposed to war risks. It separately allocates specified additional insurance costs and crew payments to charterers if the vessel proceeds, and provides that the vessel remains on hire in specified circumstances. Other charterparty provisions may materially affect the analysis. A safe-port obligation, and any express safe-route obligation, must be construed together with the war-risk clause: the latter may allocate risks that would otherwise fall under the former. A safe-port obligation is generally prospective: the question is whether, when the port is nominated, it is reasonably expected to be safe for the vessel when it is due to use it. A subsequent event making the port prospectively unsafe does not retrospectively make the original nomination a breach. In a time charter, however, the charterer may have a further obligation to give fresh orders if the port subsequently becomes prospectively unsafe. In The Evia (No. 2), the House of Lords applied the prospective-safety principle, held that the charter was frustrated and, on the particular wording, that the war-risk clause was a “complete code” allocating the relevant risks of unsafety to the owners and their insurers. For parties trading in and around the Gulf, the practical advice is straightforward: do not wait for a dispute before examining the charterparty. Owners and charterers should identify the applicable war-risk, safe-port and force majeure provisions, understand who has the contractual right to make routing and employment decisions, establish how additional premiums, diversion costs and delays are allocated, and document the factual basis for operational decisions. In a rapidly changing security environment, the question may not be whether a route is ‘open’. The more important question is who, under the particular charterparty wording, bears the contractual risk and consequences of proceeding, and whether additional obligations have been triggered.
