POSH PROJECTS PTE LTD v Owner and/or Demise Charterer of the vessel YANGTZE HARMONY (IMO No. 9318917)

Facts

Posh Projects Pte Ltd, a Singapore marine services company, chartered its tug POSH EAGLE to Yangtze Harmony Co., Limited, the demise charterer of the vessel YANGTZE HARMONY, under a towage contract dated 22 July 2022 to tow the vessel from Brisbane to Singapore. Claiming remuneration, delay payments and lien costs, Posh Projects began Admiralty in Rem No 76 of 2022 on 19 October 2022 and arrested the vessel. The defendant appeared to contest the action. Because the contract provided for arbitration in London, the action was stayed by consent in favour of arbitration, with the vessel kept under arrest as security. The vessel was judicially sold on 1 June 2023 for SGD 5,126,280.40, and after certain payments out, a balance of SGD 2,966,842.98 plus interest remained in court.

The London tribunal issued a First Award on 14 August 2024 and a Second Award on 15 November 2024 in the claimant's favour, which the defendant did not challenge. The claimant obtained permission to enforce the awards and entered judgment in personam in HC/OA 204/2025, but the defendant did not pay. In HC/SUM 1823/2025 the claimant asked the court to lift the stay, to permit enforcement of the awards as a judgment, to allow it to enter judgment in rem in terms of the awards, and to serve the order by email. The defendant was absent at the hearing on 7 August 2025, and no other interested party resisted.

Issues

1. Whether the court has power to lift a stay of admiralty in rem proceedings and enter judgment in rem so that foreign arbitral awards can be enforced against the arrested vessel's sale proceeds
2. Whether the in rem claim survives after the in personam claim has been determined by an arbitral award, or whether the two merge
3. Whether the enforcement order could be served on the defendant by email

Holding

S Mohan J allowed the application, with some amendments to the wording of the orders. The stay was lifted, the claimant was given permission to enforce the awards as a judgment of the court and to enter judgment in rem against the defendant in terms of the awards, and service by email at specified addresses and by courier to the defendant's last known registered address was permitted. Costs were fixed at S$8,000 including disbursements, payable by the defendant.

Reasoning

The judge explained that ss 6 and 7 of the International Arbitration Act 1994 require a stay of court proceedings in favour of arbitration but allow arrested property to be retained as security for the satisfaction of any award. Neither section says how a successful claimant returns to court to enforce the award against that security. Section 7 had codified the first part of the principle from The “Rena K” [1979] QB 377, on retaining security. The judge held that the second part, lifting the stay and proceeding to judgment in rem once an award is unsatisfied, exists as a residual common law power, since a stay is merely suspensory. Without it, security retained for the satisfaction of an award would be a hollow protection, particularly given the common use of one-ship companies. Nothing in the Act or the Rules of Court 2021 excluded the power, and the words of s 7(1)(a) showed Parliament intended satisfaction from the arrested property.

On merger, the judge reviewed English, Australian and New Zealand authority, including the contrasting House of Lords approach in The Indian Grace, which turned on a specific English statutory provision with no Singapore equivalent. Following Kuo Fen Ching v Dauphin Offshore Engineering & Trading Pte Ltd [1999] 2 SLR(R) 793, in rem and in personam actions continue as parallel proceedings that do not merge. Holding otherwise would create the loophole that decision warned against. The earlier conversion of the awards into an in personam judgment made no difference. The judge added a tentative view that the separate originating application may not have been necessary, without deciding the point.

On service, the email addresses had been used in the arbitration by the tribunal and the claimant, and the defendant had written from one of them, so email was a practical and effective means of service.

From the judgment