The National Industrial Transportation League (NITL) and the World Shipping Council (WSC) welcome the statement issued'by the Paris‐based International Chamber of Commerce (ICC) lending the support of the World Business Organization's Commission on Transport and Logistics to the new Rotterdam Rules convntion. The statement was released after the Commission's Maritime Transport Committee reviewed the Convention and asks governments to consider its ratification based on a set of objectives considered important to international trading interests. The ICC Commission represents all sectors involved in international transport, including shippers, carriers and forwarders. 'These objectives were communicated to the UN Commission on International Trade Law (UNCITRAL) by ICC at the outset of the Convention negotiations in 2002 and have been supported by NITL and WSC throughout those talks.

In the paper, ICC states that, "...the proposed regime will underpin an important element of international commerce." 'Also, that "The Convention aims to provide uniformity for the international carriage of goods, which at the current time is governed by a number of maritime liability regimes, absent of a global convention for multimodal transport and e‐commerce." 'In that regard, the first objective listed by ICC is, "'the importance of a harmonized liability regime for maritime transport and related door‐to‐door transport and the need to avoid regionalization."

ICC also states that it "stands ready to proactively facilitate business input into national and international discussions on the ratification of the Roterdam Rules, with a view to bringing about uniformity in this important area of international law."

NITL and WSC are members of the United States Council for International Business (USCIB) which is the US member organization of the ICC. (NITL & WSC)