TÜRK HUKUKUNDA YABANCI UNSURLU REASÜRANS SÖZLEŞMELERİNİN KURULMASI VE BU SÖZLEŞMELERDEN DOĞAN KANUNLAR İHTİLÂFI HAKKINDA BİR DEĞERLENDİRME

Işık H. A.

Akdeniz Üniversitesi Hukuk Fakültesi Dergisi, cilt.15, sa.1, ss.615-648, 2025 (TRDizin)

Özet

 Reasürans sözleşmeleri birçok hukuk sisteminde olduğu gibi Türk hukukunda da düzenlenmiştir. Konu hakkında sigorta sözleşmeleri hukuku anlamında düzenlemeler olduğu gibi sigorta denetim hukuku anlamında da birçok düzenleme kabul edilmiştir. Sigorta sözleşmelerinde genellikle sigorta ettirenin sigortacı karşısında zayıf taraf olduğu kabul edildiği için, bu sözleşmelerde sigorta ettirene azamî bir koruma sağlanmaya çalışılmaktadır. Buna karşın reasürans sözleşmeleri, kanun koyucular tarafından genellikle taraflarının irade serbestîsine bırakılan bir alandır. Zira, reasürans sözleşmelerinde tarafların tümü sigortacıdır. Bu durum ise tarafların yabancı unsurlu reasürans sözleşmelerinde hukuk seçimi anlamında da serbest olması sonucunu ortaya çıkarmaktadır. Sigorta sözleşmeleri hukuku ve hukuk seçimi bakımından durum böyleyken, sigortacılığın düzenlenen ve denetlenen bir piyasa olması hasebiyle reasürans ilişkilerinin devletler bakımından ciddi anlamda denetim altında tutulduğunu söylemek de yanlış olmayacaktır. Bu durum Türk hukukunda özellikle Türk sigortacıların yabancı reasürörlerle kurdukları reasürans sözleşmeleri bakımından önem arz etmektedir.



Reasürans sözleşmelerinin kurulması bakımından uygulamada farklı usûllerin benimsenmesi, reasüransın hukukî ve ekonomik mâhiyeti itibari ile yabancı unsurlu olmaya yatkın bir akdî ilişki doğurması ve bu alanda milletlerarası özel hukuk anlamında kamu düzeni müdahalesine esas alınabilecek veya doğrudan uygulanan kural olarak değerlendirilebilecek bazı emredici ve sınırlayıcı düzenlemelerin varlığı da konuyu önemli bir hale getirmektedir.

Bu çerçevede çalışma kapsamında yabancı unsurlu reasürans sözleşmelerinin kurulması, bu sözleşmelere uygulanacak hukukun taraflarca açık şekilde seçilmesi, hukuk seçimi olarak kabul edilen bazı özel klozlar, mahkemelerce zımnî hukuk seçimi olarak kabul edilen durumlar, hukuk seçimi yokluğunda uygulanacak hukukun tayini, reasürans havuzları, kamu düzeni ve doğrudan uygulanan kuralların bu ilişkilere etkisi konuları üzerinde durularak Türk hukuku ekseninde değerlendirmeler yapılması amaçlanmıştır. Ayrıca ilgili kısımlarda Avrupa Birliği hukuku ve karşılaştırmalı hukuktaki bazı örnekler ile doktrindeki görüşler de inceleme kapsamında değerlendirilmiştir.

Reinsurance contracts provide insurance to insurers for the risks they undertake to cover within the scope of the insurance contracts they conclude, and also serve to distribute the risks carried by insurers. These contracts are also important in terms of providing indirect cover to policyholders who enter into an insurance contract with an insurer who participates in the reinsurance contract as a ceding party. If insurers obtain reinsurance protection from a foreign reinsurer operating in another country, the risks within the country are distributed to other countries and the reinsurance contract acquires a foreign element. Reinsurance contracts are sometimes formated for the purpose of concluding an insurance relationship between the policyholder and the reinsurer rather than for the purpose of concluding a reinsurance relationship. This process is called fronting. In this case, the contracts made under the name of reinsurance should be classified and contracts that really have the nature of reinsurance should be evaluated differently in some respects from contracts made for the purpose of concluding an insurance contract by evaluating them as a reinsurance contract with a foreign element. Because, reinsurance is subject to different regulations in many legal systems, both in terms of insurance contract law and insurance supervision law. Since reinsurance contracts are generally made between parties of equal commercial power, the parties can freely decide both the content of the contract and the law to applicable to this contract. In cases where the parties do not choose the law, the applicable law is determined according to the conflict rules regarding the law applicable to the contracts, just like other contracts. In this case, the concept of “characteristic performance” emerges. In reinsurance contracts, it is accepted that the characteristic performance is the performance of the reinsurer. For this reason, law of the place of work of the debtor’s characteristic performance is applied to reinsurance contracts that do not contain a choice of law. This situation is regulated in the same way both in the continental European legal systems that Turkey has adopted and in the European Union law. Reinsurance relationships can be concluded by insurers with reinsurers, or through reinsurance pools that insurers covering the same or similar risks can conclude or become members of. In this case, a mutual reinsurance relationship is concluded between the pool members. If this relationship has a foreign element, the parties can also choose the law within the limits set by the law governing the contractual relationship between the relevant pool and its members. In addition, if the pools are established on an international scale, the reinsurance protection provided by membership in the pool also gains a foreign element.


The application of the law chosen by the parties as the contract status or resulting from the application of conflict rules may not be possible under all circumstances. Because, reinsurance contracts with a foreign element may be subject to public policy intervention for various reasons and the application of overriding mandatory rules may be required.


Within this framework, the following conclusions are reached in the article with respect to reinsurance contracts with foreign elements. Under Turkish law, the conclusion of a reinsurance contract with a foreign reinsurer is only possible if the foreign reinsurers have branches in Turkey due to mandatory regulations. However, if the proposal for the conclusion of a reinsurance relationship comes from the insurer who will be the ceding insurer, this condition is not required and the reinsurance relationship is concluded in accordance with the law.


There is no limitation or restriction on the parties’ choice of law in reinsurance contracts with foreign elements. This is because, in these contracts, there is no weak party whose interests must be protected in terms of conflict of laws.


Although reinsurance pools provide reinsurance cover to their members, the source of the legal relationship between the parties is not the reinsurance contract but the membership contract. In this respect, the classification of the relevant pool membership is of great importance in determining the law applicable to these relations.


Since insurance, and therefore reinsurance, is an intensively regulated line of business that can only be carried out with a license granted by the states, it may not always be possible to apply the law chosen by the parties as the lex contractus or as a result of the application of conflict rules. It is possible that some mandatory rules in Turkish law may be taken as a basis for public policy intervention or accepted as overriding mandatory rules. In this context, there is no provision in Turkish law that may prevent the application of the law (lex contractus) agreed to be applied to the reinsurance contract within the meaning of Article 5 of the Turkish Code of PIL through public policy. Nevertheless, the provisions of Art. 15/ II of the Turkish Code of Insurance and Art. 1401 of the Turkish Commercial Code should be accepted as overriding mandatory rules and Turkish law should be applied to reinsurance contracts with foreign elements established through ‘fronting’ transactions in order to avoid the application of Art. 15/II of the TCI and contracts formated in violation of the provisions of the “Circular” regarding foreign reinsurers that do not have branches in Turkey.