The paper defines the problem of the losses of a large number of ships under mysterious circumstances, and it sets the base hypothesis and the sub-hypotheses that it is necessary to investigate the connection of these grievous incidents and international standard that could have influence on the maritime accidents. By supplementing its basic conventions SOLAS and MARPOL and its associated codes the International Maritime Organization (IMO) seeks to raise the level of ship safety through stricter technical requirements. Because of great influence of human factor on the maritime accidents IMO has paid special attention to the requirements for education, certification and seafarers’ work by means of STCW Convention and its associated code. The knowledge from these documents, their complete recognition and exceeding of the set minimal requirements, all contribute to increase of safety and reduction of accidents at sea. Therefore, the beginning of the paper gives an overview of the mentioned IMO documents including the topical codes (Polar Code, IGF Code). More detailed analyses have shown that the safety is mostly determined by the reorganization of the work of the ship operators and work on board, and that is why the paper provides also a review of the standards of the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) which refer to the management of quality, environment, safety at work and health of people, management of energy and especially risk management. The International Labour Organization (ILO) has noted the need to regulate the work of seafarers and announced this through the MLC Convention in 2006. The Republic of Croatia has fully acknowledged the ILO requirements, and their operationalization has been elaborated in detail by classification society DNV-GL in its rules which has been studied in detail in the paper. Risk management i.e. assessment is one of the requirements that has become an integral part of IMO ISM code and all ISO standards on the management so that the paper studies as well the issue of risk significance for ship exploitation, where are given the guidelines for practical implementation of risk assessment in maritime affairs. A particular section deals with the connection, i.e. influence of the standards and conventions on the maritime accidents and loss of ships. The conclusion is that there is a strong connection between the international regulations brought by IMO and ISO and the number of maritime accidents. With the development of new and the improvement of the existing regulations, the number of accidents is reduced, thus confirming the set hypotheses about the connection between these two phenomena