Legalization of documents

WHAT IS A LEGALIZATION OF DOCUMENTS?

The legalization of documents is one of the types of recognition of Ukrainian documents abroad. Each country, having its own national legislation, issues certain documents in accordance with this legislation, pursuant to the approved samples of documents and independently of other countries. Many of such national documents are required to be presented outside the country that issued the document. And next thing is the questions coming up in the recipient country (that is, in the country where you submit a foreign document): Is this document valid? How to check it, taking into account that it is drawn up in another language and in another country and, accordingly, there are no national means of checking the legitimacy of the document in the recipient? With the express aim of simplifying such situations and avoiding cases of circulation of illegal/illegitimate documents, there is a procedure for recognition of foreign documents. All the countries of the world are divided into 3 groups regarding the approach to the recognition of foreign documents:

LEGALIZATION OR APOSTILLE

As we have already mentioned above, the legalization of a document is not the same as an apostille. To determine what you need to do (for example, to apply for an apostille to the Birth Certificate or to conduct legalization of the Birth Certificate), you should define the “relations” regarding the recognition of documents between Ukraine (i.e. the country of the document issue) and the country, wherein you are planning to submit your document. For your convenience, we have created an online form on the web-page Apostille for documents in Ukraine, where you can independently determine the procedure you need (apostille or legalization), or you can use a free-of-charge consultation of our lawyers.

WHERE CAN YOU LEGALIZE THE DOCUMENTS IN KYIV?

The authority, to which you need to apply for to legalize the document, depends on the type of the document itself. Thus, a Police Clearance Certificate can be legalized in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and a Marriage Certificate, issued in Kyiv, can be legalized in the Ministry of Justice, while, for example, a Birth Certificate, issued in Cherkasy region, can be legalized in the Department of Justice of Cherkasy region. Since the legalization of documents is the most completed option of document recognition, we would propose you to use the services of experienced lawyers.

PROCEDURE FOR LEGALIZATION OF DOCUMENTS

The legalization of documents takes place in several stages, unlike the apostille:

The 1st step: Affixing the legalization stamp to the original document.

Depending on the type of the document, one (legalization of a Police Clearance Certificate) or several (legalization of Certificates issued by a Civil Status Registration Office) stamps may be required.

The 2nd step: Translation of the document.

The translation is made into the official language of the recipient country and must be certified by a notary. If the country has several official languages ​​(for example, the UAE, Canada), the translation is made into one of the official languages.

The 3rd step: Affixing the legalization stamp to the translated document.

The legalization of the translated document certified by a notary is carried out by the Ministry of Justice. At the same time, the original document can be bounded to the translated one at the request of the applicant, or the translated document can be used as an independent document.

The 4th step: Affixing the legalization stamp by a Consulate of the recipient country.

Depending on the recipient country, the Consulate may establish its own special legalization procedure. Some countries require registration on the country's official websites (UAE), while others require documents to be submitted by a person being the citizen of that country or holding the Residence Certificate of that country (Lebanon), etc. However, most commonly, at this stage, the Consulate requires additional applicant’s documents.