Decision ID: 002114

In October 2007 the 1992 Fund Executive Committee noted that in July 2007 the Commercial Court in Lorient had rendered a judgement in respect of a claim by the owner of a restaurant in Guidel-Plage for losses in 2000 and 2001 allegedly due to the incident. It was noted that the Fund had assessed the losses in 2000 for a lesser amount than claimed and had rejected the claim for losses in 2001 on the grounds of an insufficient link of causation between the alleged losses and the pollution. It was noted that the Court, having stated that it was not bound by the Fund’s admissibility criteria, had held that the Erika incident had not had a significant impact on the 2001 tourism season since, according to studies carried out, the results of 2001 were the consequence of factors unrelated to the oil spill. It was noted that the Court had adopted the Fund’s view on the absence of a link of causation and had also held that the claimant had not proved that the losses in 2000 were greater than those assessed by the Fund.