Ukraine Joins the Hague Convention Abolishing the Requirement for Legalization
Effective December 22, 2003, Ukraine acceded to the Hague Convention Abolishing the Requirement of Legalization for Foreign Public Documents. The Convention provides for the simplified certification of public (including notarized) documents to be used in countries that have joined the convention. For additional information, see http://travel.state.gov/hague_foreign_docs.html.
The Legalization Section of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA) of Ukraine, as of December 22, no longer provides Consular legalization (also known as "authentication") of documents. From this date onward, any document intended for use abroad (i.e., court decrees, birth/marriage/death certificates) will have an apostille attached.
Ukraine's accession means that the "authentication chain" will no longer be required. Instead, U.S. documents destined for use in Ukraine (and Ukrainian documents to be used in the U.S.) should be certified by one of the officials in the jurisdiction in which the document has been executed. Said official must have been designated as competent to issue certifications by "apostille".
In the U.S. it is the office of the Secretary of State or his/her counterpart in the State where the original document was produced. In Ukraine it is the Ministry of Justice, located at M. Kotsyubinskoho 12, Kyiv, Ukraine, tel. (38-044) 235-5281 (civil registry documents, i.e. death, birth, marriage, divorce certificates, etc.), 235-4050 (notarized documents).
NOTE 1: The Ministry of Justice in Kyiv only apostilles documents that bear the seal and signature of the regional representative office of the Ministry of Justice, in addition to the seal and signature of the local registry issuing the document.
NOTE 2: Currently, the Ministry of Justice in Kyiv only apostilles notarized copies of local court decrees, and not/not original documents.
NOTE 3: All official documents legalized through the regular Ukrainian or U.S. authentication chains before December 22, 2003, will remain valid and should be accepted by all Ukrainian and American agencies.
The fee for apostilling a document is 55 hryvnya (approx. $10) per document. An apostille can be attached to the document presented by any bearer. (This is different from the procedure before, when the owner of the document, i.e. the person whose name appears on it, had to present it personally or grant his/her representative a notarized power of attorney.) A regular apostille takes five or less business days. If the Ministry of Justice does not have a sample of a seal and/or signature on file, the process will take 20 business days.
With this certification by the Hague Convention apostille, the document is entitled to recognition in the country of intended use, and no certification by the Authentications Office or legalization by the embassy or consulate of the foreign country where the document is to be used is required.
We will continue to work closely with the appropriate Ukrainian government officials to obtain more details, and will post additional information on our website (http://kyiv.usembassy.gov) as soon as it becomes available.
Sincerely,
American Citizens Services
Consular Section
U.S. Embassy in Kyiv, Ukraine
tel: 38-044-490-4422
fax: 38-044-490-4040
e-mail: kyivadoptions@state.gov
Web site: http://kyiv.usembassy.gov