Chinese law update Background China has recently promulgated the Regulation of the People’s Republic of China on the Prevention and Control of Marine Pollution from Ships (hereinafter the Regulation), which repeals the old one (1983 Regulation of the People’s Republic of China on the Prevention and Control of Marine Pollution from Ships). The new Regulation will take effect on March 1, 2010. Intention of the Regulation It intends to build up a systematic structure for ship-induced pollution response in China in order to control and prevent marine pollution from ships. It is an administrative regulation in essence, which regulates a wide range of issues including oil pollution response planning, oil spill clean-up arrangements, supervision of the loading, lightening and discharging of the polluting and hazardous cargos, investigation and compensation of pollution incidents, establishment of domestic compensation Fund and punishment for contravening any of the requirements of the Regulation etc. Significant developments with the Regulation The most significant development in this Regulation is that according to the Article 33, the operators of the ships carrying polluting and hazardous liquid in bulk, and other ships of above 10,000 GT, must conclude a pollution cleanup operation contract with approved pollution cleanup companies before entry of the port in order to specify the rights and responsibilities of all concerned parties in case of a pollution accident.  The cleanup companies can then conduct cleanup operations immediately after such accident. This resembles the OPA 1990. Each port will have one or more pollution response companies and they must be approved by the China MSA. Dealing with clean up costs With regard to dealing with clean up costs one of the most significant developments is probably the provisions on the claim for clean-up costs, that is, the cleanup costs of emergency response action will be compensated in priority from the oil pollution c