In countries such as Italy and Panama which have signed the Hague Convention of 5 October 1961 on the abolition of the legalization of foreign public acts, the need to legalise acts and documents issued by foreign authorities is replaced by another formality: the affixing of the “footnote” (or apostille).
Therefore, a person from a country that has acceded to this Convention does not need to go to the Consular Representation and ask for legalization, but can go to the competent internal authority designated by each State – and indicated for each country in the act of accession to the Convention itself (usually the Ministry of Foreign Affairs) – to obtain the affixing of the apostille on the document. At the end of the process, the document must be translated by an official translator and then apostilled the signature of the translator, thus perfected, the document is recognized in Italy.
The list of authorities competent to affix the apostille for each of the above mentioned States is available on the website of the Hague Conference on Private International Law: http://www.hcch.net/.
The Apostille of The Hague is affixed by the State that issued the document:
- in panama at the Ministero degli Affari Esteri della Repubblica di Panama.
- In Italy: for notarial, judicial and civil status documents, contact the Judicial Offices in whose jurisdiction the documents to be legalized have been formed; for other administrative acts (e.g. the signature of the Mayor) contact the Prefect territorially competent, except for the Aosta Valley (President of the Region) and the provinces of Trento and Bolzano (Government Commissioner).
It is not necessary to translate the Apostille affixed to a document to be enforced in Italy.