The Interpretation of Article 17(2) of the Montreal Convention in Iberia Líneas Aéreas de España (C-218/24)

Companion animals are in many instances at the heart of family life and are widely recognised as sentient and irreplaceable members of households. This reality forms the backdrop to Iberia Líneas Aéreas de España (C-218/24), where the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) was asked whether the loss of a companion animal, Mona, during international air carriage (between Buenos Aires and Barcelona) could be reduced to the loss of ‘baggage’ under Article 17(2) of the 1999 Montreal Convention. It decided that it should be so reduced. The case raised a broader socio-legal issue: can an international liability regime built around replaceable objects accommodate multispecies families?

The Referred Case and the Court’s Ruling

The referring court asked whether Article 17(2) must be interpreted as meaning that the loss of a companion animal falls outside the Convention’s ‘baggage’ regime, given the Convention’s silence on the definition of ‘baggage’ and the sentient nature of companion animals. (Montreal Convention arts. 17(2), 22(2)–(5), 29).

The CJEU ruled in this instance that companion animals must be treated as ‘baggage’ within the meaning of Articles 17(2) and 22(2) and cannot be treated as ‘passengers’. While this clarifies the applicable liability regime, it also crystallises the tension between contemporary multispecies family life, the legal status of companion animals across the Union, the emotional harm inherent in losing a companion animal, and a liability regime premised on replaceable objects.

Building on earlier case law (Vueling Airlines, C-86/19), the CJEU confirmed that the Article 22(2) limit is an absolute maximum, which applies to the totality of the damage (material or not) absent a special declaration of interest. Psychological distress inherent in losing a companion is thus subsumed within the same liability rules applicable to the loss of suitcases.

European Private Law Perspective on the Legal Status of Companion Animals

By contrast, European private law already reflects multispecies family life and challenges the reduction of sentient family members to replaceable objects. 

Member State law increasingly recognises that the loss of companion animals inflicts compensable emotional harm on human guardians. Social facts point the same way: companion animals are central to European households and consumer and citizen expectations (FEDIAF, Facts & Figures 2025; Eurobarometer, Attitudes of Europeans toward Animal Welfare (Oct. 2023)).

Spain’s Civil Code recognises animals as ‘seres vivos dotados de sensibilidad’ and directs courts resolving custody of companion animals to consider the animal’s welfare and the family’s interests (Ley 17/2021; CC art. 333 bis; CC art. 94 bis). Courts have ordered shared custody and awarded moral damages for a dog’s wrongful death, stressing that value cannot be reduced to market price (Juzgado de 1ª Instancia Valladolid, Sent., 27 May 2019; AP Valencia (Secc. 11ª), Sent. 577/2009, 14 Oct. 2009). 

Portugal’s Civil Code Article 493.º-A(3) makes compensable the ‘moral damage for the shock and distress associated with the death of the specific and irreplaceable companion animal,’ and the Lisbon Court of Appeal has upheld such non-pecuniary damages (Lei N°8/2017; Lisbon CA, 12 July 2021).

France recognises animals as ‘êtres vivants doués de sensibilité’ (Code civil art. 515-14), and the Cour de cassation has long accepted préjudice moral for wrongful killing (Cour de cassation, 1re civ. 16 Jan. 1962, Lunus), describing a dog as ‘a living being, unique and irreplaceable … intended to receive [the guardian’s] affection, without any economic purpose,’ rejecting the logic of replacement value from consumer law (Cour de cassation, 1re civ., 9 Dec. 2015, Delgado).

Germany’s BGB §90a states that animals are ‘not things’, anchoring their non-fungibility in private law. Italy’s courts of merit protect the human-animal bond as part of personal integrity and have compensated non-economic loss (Tribunale di Pavia, Sent., 16 Sept. 2016, n. 1266; Tribunale di Venezia, Sent., 17 Dec. 2020, n. 1936). 

This pan-European consensus forms part of the broader European legal and social context in which the Montreal Convention operates and should have informed the Court’s interpretation.

The CJEU’s Interpretive Method and Its Limits in Iberia

Because Montreal operates as EU law (Council Decision 2001/539/EC; TFEU art. 216(2)), the Court must read it in harmony with EU primary law, applying the Vienna Convention’s interpretive rules (VCLT arts. 31–32) and its own teleological–evolutive method (CJEU, Kadi, Joined Cases C-402/05 P & C-415/05 P; Racke, C-162/96; Air Transport Association of America, C-366/10).

Beginning with ordinary meaning, ‘baggage’ in common usage denotes inanimate objects, not sentient beings with welfare interests, which makes reading Article 17(2) as including sentient animals difficult to reconcile with good-faith interpretation (VCLT art. 31). The CJEU acknowledges that the term refers to objects yet holds that this does not in itself exclude companion animals from that concept. 

As to context and systemic coherence, subsequent and surrounding norms form part of the interpretive context, including Article 13 TFEU, which recognises animals as sentient beings and requires full regard to their welfare when shaping, inter alia, transport policy, as well as Charter of Fundamental Rights protections for private and family life (art. 7), property (art. 17), and consumer protection (art. 38) (VCLT art. 31(3)(c)). The Court recalls that animal welfare is an objective of general interest for the Union yet concludes that it does not preclude animals from being classified as ‘baggage’, provided welfare requirements are met during transport. Contextually, it stresses the need for an ‘equitable balance of interests’ between carriers and passengers.

From an evolutive perspective, international instruments are not usually frozen to their meaning at the time of adoption (ICJ, Namibia; ICJ, Gabčíkovo; ECtHR ‘living instrument’ line; see also Racke; ATAA). In this case, however, the CJEU emphasises the need for uniform and predictable liability limits, relying on earlier case law to justify an absolute cap per passenger, and privileges the stability of the Convention’s liability architecture over an interpretation that would reflect contemporary multispecies family life.

On that methodological terrain, three consequences should have followed:
(1) The Convention’s silence on the definition of ‘baggage’ should make ordinary meaning a relevant constraint, and weigh against treating sentient, non-fungible family members as luggage (VCLT art. 31). 
(2) Where multiple interpretations are textually plausible, the most consistent with EU primary law should prevail: here, one that gives effect to Article 13 TFEU and to Charter rights implicated when multispecies families travel (Kadi; ATAA). 
(3) The chosen interpretation should sustain effective, predictable, and rights-compatible liability rules for consumers across the Union, rather than reducing foreseeable moral injury to the replacement value of a suitcase (VCLT art. 31; Racke).

The Court nevertheless prioritised carriers’ economic interests over alignment with contemporary multispecies family life realities and the Union’s own legal recognition of animals as sentient beings.

Implications of Iberia for Article 17(2) 

Three consequences follow from the interpretation. First, companion animals are legally assimilated to baggage: their loss triggers the liability regime applicable to goods, regardless of their sentience and the non-material harm suffered by their guardians. Second, the liability cap extends to non-material damage: Article 22(2) limit applies to all compensable loss, absent a special declaration of interest. Third, the special declaration of interest is ill-suited to sentient beings. It presupposes a quantifiable material value that cannot capture the relational value of a companion animal. The referring court itself outlined this inadequacy.

Conclusion

The central question in Iberia was whether a liability regime designed for objects can meaningfully address the loss of a family member in contemporary Europe. The CJEU answered by assimilating companion animals to baggage. 

The judgment exposes the distance between, on the one hand, EU primary law’s recognition of animal sentience and of animal welfare as an objective of general interest and, on the other, liability regimes that treat sentient companions as inanimate objects. It also sits at odds with Member State private law developments that regard companion animals as unique, irreplaceable beings whose loss gives rise compensable moral harm.

About the author:

Marine Lercier is a PhD candidate in Global Animal Law and a Doctoral Researcher at the Autonomous University of Barcelona. Her research develops the emerging field of Animal Labour Law ©, aiming to recognise labour rights for non-human animals. Using racehorses as a case study, she advocates for a legal right to retirement beyond their racing careers.

She is the Founder and Executive Director of the International Centre for Animal Rights and Ethics (ICARE), and Founder and Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Animal Rights Law.She also serves on the board of the Culture and Animals Foundation (CAF). In 2022, she ran as a candidate in the French parliamentary elections with the Animalist Party, and later contributed to revising their national and european political programmes.