Apostille is a special stamp affixed to public documents originating from institutions and organizations of the countries - participants of the Hague Convention in accordance with the Hague Convention Abolishing the Requirement of Legalization for Foreign Public Documents, does not require any further certification or legalization and is recognized by public authorities of the countries – participants of the Convention. 

Apostille can be affixed to a document itself or be attached to it on a separate sheet of paper. The certificate has a standard form required by the Convention and in numbered fields contains information of the country of origin of a document, the person who signed it as well as information of who, where and when certified the document, this person’s signature and seal, registration number. In the certificate upper part, there is a mandatory APOSTILLE (Convention de la Haye du 5 octobre 1961) inscription. Apostilization procedure takes 5-15 days.
 

The point of the Convention is that when apostille has been affixed to a document originating from a country – participant of the Convention, no additional legalization for this document use in another participant country is required. This is the first important advantage of apostille in comparison with consular certification. The second one is that all certification is done within one jurisdiction and the certification chain shortens, thus saving money, efforts and, what is of most importance, time of international activities participants.

In accordance with the Convention requirements, only public documents – that is the documents signed by state officials, notarial acts, etc. can be certified with apostille. Apostille certifies authenticity of public officials’ or notaries’ signatures. Maintenance of a document by the authority that attached apostille is neither confirmed nor verified. It is the matter of good conscience of a document drafter.
 

Each country at its own discretion authorizes some or other public authorities to do such certification. In Ukraine the following agencies are authorized to affix apostille:

• Ministry of Justice of Ukraine – on documents issued by justice authorities and courts as well as on the documents formalized by any notary public of Ukraine;
• Ministry of Education and Science of Ukraine – on public documents issued by educational institutions, public authorities, businesses, institutions and organizations relating to the sphere of education and science;
• Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine – on any other kinds of documents.

Apostille is attached to

• The documents originating from judicial authorities of Ukraine;
• The documents originating from prosecution agencies and justice authorities of Ukraine;
• Administrative documents;
• The documents of education and academic ranks;
• The documents formalized by state and private notaries.
• Official certifications of the documents signed by persons in their private capacity, such as official certificates of registering a document or a fact existing to a certain date and both officially and notarially certified signatures.

Present rules do not refer to

• The documents issued by foreign diplomatic institutions of Ukraine;
• Administrative documents directly pertaining to commercial or customs formalities.