The Seafarers' Identity Documents Convention, 1958, was adopted in Geneva on 13 May 1958 by the General Conference of the International Labour Organisation at its forty-first session, which opened on 29 April. The seventh item on the agenda was the reciprocal or international recognition of seafarers' national identity cards. It is not Convention No. 185 of 2003, which revises it. The authentic texts are English and French. It was registered with the United Nations as UNTS No. 5598, volume 389, by the ILO on 5 March 1961.

Article 1 applies to every seafarer engaged in any capacity on board a vessel, other than a ship of war, registered in a territory for which the Convention is in force and ordinarily engaged in maritime navigation. Doubt as to categories of persons is determined by the competent authority after consultation with the shipowners' and seafarers' organisations concerned. Article 2: each Member shall issue, on application, to each of its nationals who is a seafarer a document conforming with Article 4; if that is impracticable for special classes, a passport indicating that the holder is a seafarer has the same effect. It may also issue the document to other seafarers serving on a vessel registered in its territory or registered at an employment office there.

Article 3: the document shall remain in the seafarer's possession at all times. Article 4 requires a simple, durable design, fashioned so that alterations are easily detectable, with the issuing authority, the date and place of issue, and a statement that it is a seafarer's identity document for the purpose of this Convention. Particulars of the bearer include, in principle, name, birth, nationality, physical characteristics, photograph, and signature or, if unable to sign, a thumbprint. The precise form is decided by the Member after consultation; national laws may prescribe further particulars. No printing specification is transcribed.

Article 5: any seafarer holding a valid document issued by the competent authority of a territory for which this Convention is in force shall be readmitted to that territory, for at least one year after any expiry date indicated. Article 6 requires each Member to permit entry for temporary shore leave while the ship is in port and, if the document contains space for entries, for joining or transferring ship, transit to join a ship in another country or repatriation, or any other purpose approved by the authorities. The Member may require evidence of intention and may limit the stay; nothing in the article restricts the right to prevent any particular individual from entering or remaining. No visa or border-control handbook is transcribed.

Article 7: formal ratifications shall be communicated to the Director-General of the International Labour Office for registration. Article 8: the Convention is binding only on Members whose ratifications have been registered; it comes into force twelve months after two ratifications have been registered, and thereafter twelve months after each later registration. According to the UNTS note, it came into force on 19 February 1961. Article 9: denunciation after ten years from first entry into force, taking effect one year after registration, then at ten-year intervals.

The Director-General notifies ILO Members of ratifications and denunciations and, upon the second ratification, of the date the Convention will come into force; he communicates full particulars to the UN Secretary-General under Article 102 of the Charter. The Governing Body may report to the Conference on the working of the Convention and on the desirability of revision. If a new revising Convention comes into force, ratification of it involves ipso jure denunciation of this one, which then ceases to be open to ratification, remaining in force for Members that have not ratified the revising instrument. After Convention No. 185, C108 is no longer open to ratification.

Cover: the Palais des Nations in Geneva, the setting of ILO conferences; we do not claim the hall of the maritime session. Wikimedia Commons, free licence.

Sources consulted: Seafarers' Identity Documents Convention, 1958; Convention (No. 108) concerning Seafarers' National Identity Documents.