Effects and Limits of Iran's Accession to the Apostille Convention

Abstract

Accession to international conventions has various effects on the domestic laws of countries, and it is essential to examine these effects. In the meantime, Iran's accession to the 1961 Hague Convention, which aims to facilitate the process of authentication of foreign public documents, is of particular importance. This convention aims to eliminate additional stages of authentication and seeks to simplify the process of authentication of public documents of member countries in order to make the use of these documents easier among member countries. Therefore, the purpose of the present study is to answer this question: What is the necessity of Iran's accession to the Apostille Convention? The method of analysis is library (documentary) and the tool is in the form of a record, and the method of analysis is also descriptive-analytical. The results showed that by joining this convention and implementing its provisions, some of Iran's laws in interactions with member countries have been implicitly canceled. Among these cases, we can mention Article 1295, Paragraph 4 and Article 1296 of the Civil Code, which are about international legal relations. Also, Article 2, Paragraph A of the Law on Translation of Statements and Documents in Official Courts has been affected. These changes have been made in order to harmonize with international regulations and create unity in the legal system. Iran’s accession to the aforementioned convention, given its significant benefits, will not only help attract foreign investment, but also prevent the outflow of foreign currency for document certification. This measure, considering national interests, is a beneficial and necessary step, and it is appropriate that the process of joining this convention be followed more quickly and accurately so that we can benefit from its benefits.