Every public document has some legal power within a particular territory (also called 'jurisdiction'). It may entitle a person to do something (normally such documents are power of attorney and court decisions), or it may inform other people about some legal facts. Say, birth certificate informs general public that a particular person is a child of particular parents. Usually, there is no problem to enforce a document within a territory, where the document has been issued. For instance, if you have a power of attorney duly issued in the state of New York, which entitles you to manage somebody's bank account, you may freely use it in any New York bank. 

​

The problem may occur when you need to use a document in another jurisdiction. Suppose you need to withdraw funds from Canadian bank account, opened in Toronto bank by means of a power of attorney, issued in New York. Canadian bank officers may not be familiar with New York laws governing proxy relationship. As a result, your request may be declined.

 

In order to prevent such situations, international law community developed universal mechanism of transferring legal power of a document to the foreign jurisdictions. Such mechanism is called Apostille (from the French verb “apostiller”, which derives from the old French word postille meaning “annotation”, and before it the Latin word "postilla", a variation of the word "postea", which means “thereafter, afterwards, next”). Colloquially, Apostille is a stamp or a certificate attached to a document by state authority in accordance with the provisions of the Convention of 5 October 1961 Abolishing the Requirement of Legalisation for Foreign Public Documents (hereinafter - "Apostille Convention").

​

Limitations. Apostille legal effect has limitations. Firstly, it only authenticates the origin of the underlying public document. It does so by certifying the authenticity of the signature on the document, the capacity in which the person signing the document acted and, where appropriate, the identity of the seal or stamp which the document bears (Art. 5(2)). An Apostille does not certify the content of a public document, nor that all requirements of domestic law for proper execution of the underlying public document are met. And finally, an Apostille does not affect the acceptance, admissibility or probative value of the underlying public document. 

​

The Apostille Convention only applies if both the State in whose territory the public document was executed (the “State of origin”) and the State in whose territory the public document is to be produced (the “State of destination”) are State Parties to the Apostille Convention. It means that if you have a public document issued in the State of New York, and you plan to use it in the United Arab Emirates, which are not a State Party to the Apostille Convention. To find out which States are Contracting States, check the list of Contracting States.

​

The Convention gives no effect to Apostilles when they are produced in a State non-Party or a State Party, but the Convention is not in force as between that State and the State of origin as a result of an objection to accession. However, an Apostille may be issued in a State Party for a public document that was issued before the entry into force of the Convention for the State of origin.

​

Convention only applies to public documents. The term “public document” extends to all documents other than those issued by persons in their private capacity (i.e., not private documents) (see the Explanatory Report under Section B, I. Article 1). Accordingly, any document executed by an authority or a person in an official capacity (i.e., acting in the capacity of an officer endowed with power to execute the document by the State) is a public document. An Apostille may not be rejected on the basis that the underlying document is not considered to be a public document under the law of the State of destination, although that law may determine what legal effect to give to the underlying document. Private documents such as power of attorney, contracts etc. may be apostillized, if they are authenticated by a notary public or similar official. 

​

Different countries treat differently the issue whether a copy of a document may be authenticated over the mechanism of Apostille Convention. In most cases the copy has to be certified by an official in order to be apostillized.

​

The expiration of a validity period, although it may terminate the effect of the public document in the State of origin, does not ordinarily deprive the document of its public nature unless otherwise provided for under the law of the State of origin. As long as the expired document is still a public document, it may be apostillised.

​

An Apostille only authenticates the signature / seal of a single official or authority. As a result, one Apostille may not be issued for multiple documents that are executed by different officials. In the interests of expediency, some Competent Authorities do issue a single Apostille for multiple documents that have been bundled together where each document in the bundle is executed by the same official or authority.

​

Case law as well as explanatory materials on the Apostille Convention may be found on the web-site of Hague Conference on Private International Law. Our firm provides legal opinion services in regard to the application of the Apostille Convention.

​

​

​

​

​