E D & F Man Sugar Ltd v Unicargo Transportgesellschaft mbH [2012] EWHC 2879 (Comm), [2012] All ER (D) 256 (Oct)
As a matter of construction, the phrase “government interferences” in the Sugar Charter Party Form 1999 was not intended to encompass an administrative re-scheduling of cargoes due to a fire. The phrase could not have been intended to encompass a state-sponsored port authority acting in the ordinary course of discharging its port or berth administrative function (in the same manner as any other, private port authority), as distinct from a government entity acting specifically or peculiarly in a sovereign capacity which was independent of that ordinary administrative function. What was required, at the least, was an act by a port authority, that was also a government entity, which amounted to the discharge of a sovereign function and which differed from an ordinary administrative act of which any port or berth authority (state-owned or operated or otherwise) would be
capable in the day-to-day management of a berth.
