Article 6
FACILITATION OF SHORE LEAVE AND TRANSIT AND TRANSFER OF SEAFARERS
1. Any seafarer who holds a valid seafarers’ identity document issued in accordance with the provisions of this Convention by a Member for which the Convention is in force shall be recognized as a seafarer within the meaning of the Convention unless clear grounds exist for doubting the authenticity of the seafarers’ identity document.
2. The verification and any related inquiries and formalities needed to ensure that the seafarer for whom entry is requested pursuant to paragraphs 3 to 6 or 7 to 9 below is the holder of a seafarers’ identity document issued in accordance with the requirements of this Convention shall be at no cost to the seafarers or shipowners.
Shore leave
3. Verification and any related inquiries and formalities referred to in paragraph 2 above shall be carried out in the shortest possible time provided that reasonable advance notice of the holder’s arrival was received by the competent authorities. The notice of the holder’s arrival shall include the details specified in section 1 of Annex II.
4. Each Member for which this Convention is in force shall, in the shortest possible time, and unless clear grounds exist for doubting the authenticity of the seafarers’ identity document, permit the entry into its territory of a seafarer holding a valid seafarer’s identity document, when entry is requested for temporary shore leave while the ship is in port.
5. Such entry shall be allowed provided that the formalities on arrival of the ship have been fulfilled and the competent authorities have no reason to refuse permission to come ashore on grounds of public health, public safety, public order or national security.
6. For the purpose of shore leave seafarers shall not be required to hold a visa. Any Member which is not in a position to fully implement this requirement shall ensure that its laws and regulations or practice provide arrangements that are substantially equivalent.
Transit and transfer
7. Each Member for which this Convention is in force shall, in the shortest possible time, also permit the entry into its territory of seafarers holding a valid seafarers’ identity document supplemented by a passport, when entry is requested for the purpose of:
a) joining their ship or transferring to another ship;
b) passing in transit to join their ship in another country or for repatriation; or any other purpose approved by the authorities of the Member concerned.
8. Such entry shall be allowed unless clear grounds exist for doubting the authenticity of the seafarers’ identity document, provided that the competent authorities have no reason to refuse entry on grounds of public health, public safety, public order or national security.
9. Any Member may, before permitting entry into its territory for one of the purposes specified in paragraph 7 above, require satisfactory evidence, including documentary evidence of a seafarer’s intention and ability to carry out that intention. The Member may also limit the seafarer’s stay to a period considered reasonable for the purpose in question.
Article 7
CONTINUOUS POSSESSION AND WITHDRAWAL
1. The seafarers’ identity document shall remain in the seafarer’s possession at all times, except when it is held for safekeeping by the master of the ship concerned, with the seafarer’s written consent.
2. The seafarers’ identity document shall be promptly withdrawn by the issuing State if it is ascertained that the seafarer no longer meets the conditions for its issue under this Convention. Procedures for suspending or withdrawing seafarers’ identity documents shall be drawn up in consultation with the representative shipowners’ and seafarers’ organizations and shall include procedures for administrative appeal.
Article 8
AMENDMENT OF THE ANNEXES
1. Subject to the relevant provisions of this Convention, amendments to the Annexes may be made by the International Labour Conference, acting on the advice of a duly constituted tripartite maritime body of the International Labour Organization. The decision shall require a majority of two-thirds of the votes cast by the delegates present at the Conference, including at least half the Members that have ratified this Convention.
2. Any Member that has ratified this Convention may give written notice to the Director-General within six months of the date of the adoption of such an amendment that it shall not enter into force for that Member, or shall only enter into force at a later date upon subsequent written notification.
Article 9
TRANSITIONAL PROVISION
Any Member which is a party to the Seafarers’ Identity Documents Convention, 1958, and which is taking measures, in accordance with article 19 of the Constitution of the International Labour Organisation, with a view to ratification of this Convention may notify the Director-General of its intention to apply the present Convention provisionally. A seafarers’ identity document issued by such a Member shall be treated for the purposes of this Convention as a seafarers’ identity document issued under it provided that the requirements of Articles 2 to 5 of this Convention are fulfilled and that the Member concerned accepts seafarers’ identity documents issued under this Convention.
FINAL PROVISIONS
Article 10
This Convention revises the Seafarers’ Identity Documents Convention, 1958.
Article 11
The formal ratifications of this Convention shall be communicated to the Director-General of the International Labour Office for registration.
Article 12
1. This Convention shall be binding only upon those Members of the International Labour Organization whose ratifications have been registered with the Director-General.
2. It shall come into force six months after the date on which the ratifications of two Members have been registered with the Director-General.
3. Thereafter, this Convention shall come into force for any Member six months after the date on which its ratification has been registered.
Article 13
1. A Member which has ratified this Convention may denounce it after the expiration of ten years from the date on which the Convention first comes into force, by an act communicated to the Director-General for registration. Such denunciation shall take effect twelve months after the date on which it is registered.
2. Each Member which has ratified this Convention and which does not, within the year following the expiration of the period of ten years mentioned in the preceding paragraph, exercise the right of denunciation provided for in this Article, shall be bound for another period of ten years and, thereafter, may denounce this Convention at the expiration of each period of ten years under the terms provided for in this Article.
Article 14
1. The Director-General shall notify all Members of the registration of all ratifications, declarations and acts of denunciation communicated by the Members.
2. When notifying the Members of the registration of the second ratification of this Convention, the Director-General shall draw the attention of the Members to the date upon which the Convention shall come into force.
3. The Director-General shall notify all Members of the registration of any amendments made to the Annexes in accordance with Article 8, as well as of notifications relating thereto.
Article 15
The Director-General of the International Labour Office shall communicate to the Secretary-General of the United Nations, for registration in accordance with article 102 of the Charter of the United Nations, full particulars of all ratifications, declarations and acts of denunciation registered by the Director-General in accordance with the provisions of the preceding Articles.
Article 16
At such times as it may consider necessary, the Governing Body of the International Labour Office shall present to the General Conference a report on the working of this Convention and shall examine the desirability of placing on the agenda of the Conference the question of its revision in whole or in part, taking account also of the provisions of Article 8.
Article 17
1. Should the Conference adopt a new Convention revising this Convention in whole or in part, then, unless the new Convention otherwise provides:
a) the ratification by a Member of the new revising Convention shall ipso jure involve the immediate denunciation of this Convention, notwithstanding the provisions of Article 13, if and when the new revising Convention shall have come into force;
b) as from the date when the new revising Convention comes into force, this Convention shall cease to be open to ratification by the Members.
2. This Convention shall in any case remain in force in its actual form and content for those Members which have ratified it but have not ratified the revising Convention.
Article 18
The English and French versions of the text of this Convention are equally authoritative.
Annex I
Model for seafarers’ identity document
The seafarers’ identity document, whose form and content are set out below, shall consist of good-quality materials which, as far as practicable, having regard to considerations such as cost, are not easily accessible to the general public. The document shall have no more space than is necessary to contain the information provided for by the Convention.
It shall contain the name of the issuing State and the following statement:
„This document is a seafarers’ identity document for the purpose of the Seafarers’ Identity Documents Convention (Revised), 2003, of the International Labour Organization. This document is a stand-alone document and not a passport.”
The data page(s) of the document indicated in bold below shall be protected by a laminate or overlay, or by applying an imaging technology and substrate material that provide an equivalent resistance to substitution of the portrait and other biographical data.
The materials used, dimensions and placement of data shall conform to the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) specifications as contained in Document 9303 Part 3 (2nd edition, 2002) or Document 9303 Part 1 (5th edition, 2003).
Other security features shall include at least one of the following features:
Watermarks, ultraviolet security features, use of special inks, special colour designs, perforated images, holograms, laser engraving, micro-printing, and heat-sealed lamination.
Data to be entered on the data page(s) of the seafarers’ identity document shall be restricted to:
I. Issuing authority:
II. Telephone number(s), email and web site of the authority:
III. Date and place of issue:
- Digital or original photograph of seafarer -
a) Full name of seafarer:
b) Sex:
c) Date and place of birth:
d) Nationality:
e) Any special physical characteristics of seafarer that may assist identification:
f) Signature:
g) Date of expiry:
h) Type or designation of document:
i) Unique document number:
j) Personal identification number (optional):
k) Biometric template based on a fingerprint printed as numbers in a bar code conforming to a standard to be developed:
l) A machine-readable zone conforming to ICAO specifications in Document 9303 specified above.
IV. Official seal or stamp of the issuing authority.
Explanation of data
The captions on fields on the data page(s) above may be translated into the language(s) of the issuing State. If the national language is other than English, French or Spanish, the captions shall also be entered in one of these languages.
The Roman alphabet should be used for all entries in this document.
The information listed above shall have the following characteristics:
I. Issuing authority: ISO code for the issuing State and the name and full address of the office issuing the seafarers’ identity document as well as the name and position of the person authorizing the issue.
II. The telephone number, email and web site shall correspond to the links to the focal point referred to in the Convention.
III. Date and place of issue: the date shall be written in two-digit Arabic numerals in the form day/month/year - e.g. 31/12/03; the place shall be written in the same way as on the national passport.
- Size of the portrait photograph: as in ICAO Document 9303 specified above -
a) Full name of seafarer: where applicable, family name shall be written first, followed by the seafarer’s other names;
b) Sex: specify „M” for male or „F” for female;
c) Date and place of birth: the date shall be written in two-digit Arabic numerals in the form day/month/year; the place shall be written in the same way as on the national passport;
d) Statement of nationality: specify nationality;
e) Special physical characteristics: any evident characteristics assisting identification;
f) Signature of seafarer;
g) Date of expiry: in two-digit Arabic numerals in the form day/month/year;
h) Type or designation of document: character code for document type, written in capitals in the Roman alphabet (S);
i) Unique document number: country code (see I above) followed by an alphanumeric book inventory number of no more than nine characters;
j) Personal identification number: optional personal identification number of the seafarer; identification number of no more than 14 alphanumeric characters;
k) Biometric template: precise specification to be developed;
l) Machine-readable zone: according to ICAO Document 9303 specified above.
Annex II
Electronic database
The details to be provided for each record in the electronic database to be maintained by each Member in accordance with Article 4, paragraphs 1, 2, 6 and 7 of this Convention shall be restricted to:
Section 1
1. Issuing authority named on the identity document.
2. Full name of seafarer as written on the identity document.
3. Unique document number of the identity document.
4. Date of expiry or suspension or withdrawal of the identity document.
Section 2
5. Biometric template appearing on the identity document.
6. Photograph.
7. Details of all inquiries made concerning the seafarers’ identity document.
Annex III
Requirements and recommended procedures and practices concerning the issuance of seafarers’ identity documents
This Annex sets out minimum requirements relating to procedures to be adopted by each Member in accordance with Article 5 of this Convention, with respect to the issuance of seafarers’ identity documents (referred to below as „SIDs”), including quality-control procedures.
Part A lists the mandatory results that must be achieved, as a minimum, by each Member, in implementing a system of issuance of SIDs.
Part B recommends procedures and practices for achieving those results. Part B is to be given full consideration by Members, but is not mandatory.
Part A: Mandatory results
1. Production and delivery of blank SIDs
Processes and procedures are in place to ensure the necessary security for the production and delivery of blank SIDs, including the following: