Legalization of Documents Between Georgia and Iran - the Consular Chain, Step by Step

Why there is no apostille for Iran or Afghanistan

The 1961 Hague Convention replaced consular legalization with a single apostille stamp among its member states. Georgia joined in 2007; Iran and Afghanistan have not joined. A Georgian apostille on a document bound for Iran is meaningless there, and an Iranian document cannot carry one. Instead, both countries apply consular legalization: the issuing country's authorities certify the document, and the receiving country's embassy legalizes that certification. This applies to all public documents - the shenasnameh and its extracts, marriage and divorce documents, police clearance certificates, diplomas and transcripts, court decisions, notarial acts, company registration documents and powers of attorney. It does not apply to passports, driving licenses and private documents such as bank statements, which are translated directly.

Iranian documents for use in Georgia: the chain

• Step 1 - official translation in Iran: the original is translated, usually into English, by a darolttarjomeh-ye rasmi licensed by the judiciary. The translator binds the translation to a copy of the original with an official stamp.
• Step 2 - Ministry of Justice: the official translation is stamped by the Ministry of Justice (Dadgostari), confirming the translator's license.
• Step 3 - Ministry of Foreign Affairs: the document is stamped by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, confirming the Ministry of Justice stamp.
• Step 4 - Georgian Embassy in Tehran: the Georgian embassy legalizes the Ministry of Foreign Affairs stamp. Submissions are made in person or through a representative; our partner in Tehran handles this for clients already in Georgia.
• Step 5 - translation and notarization in Tbilisi: once the legalized bundle is in Georgia, we translate the Persian original and every stamp into Georgian and the notary certifies the translation, usually within 1-2 hours.

Some documents require prior confirmation from the issuing body before step 1 - university diplomas need confirmation from the Ministry of Science or the Ministry of Health for medical degrees, and school certificates from the Ministry of Education. Skipping this is the most common cause of a rejected chain.

Georgian documents for use in Iran: the reverse chain

• Step 1 - translation and notarization: we translate the Georgian document into Persian and the notary certifies the translation.
• Step 2 - Georgian Ministry of Foreign Affairs: the notarized document is certified by the Consular Department of the Georgian MFA in Tbilisi, which we submit and collect.
• Step 3 - Iranian Embassy in Tbilisi: the certified document is legalized by the consular section of the Iranian embassy, which we submit and collect.
• Step 4 - in Iran: Iranian authorities generally require the legalized document to be officially translated by a darolttarjomeh in Iran and stamped by the Ministry of Justice and MFA again; our Persian translation is the basis for that step and avoids re-translation errors.

Delivery to Iran is by the courier services that operate there or by a trusted carrier; we advise on the current options at the time of order.

Documents most often legalized between Iran and Georgia

• Students: diplomas and transcripts (with Ministry of Science or Health confirmation), school certificates, police clearance certificates for the student residence permit.
• Residence and family: police clearance certificates, marriage documents, shenasnameh extracts for children, divorce documents.
• Marriage in Georgia: certificate of marital status, shenasnameh, divorce documents where applicable.
• Business: official gazette entries, company charters, board resolutions, powers of attorney for company registration in Georgia.
• Property: powers of attorney for buying or selling Georgian property from Iran, and Georgian Public Registry extracts for Iranian courts and heirs.
• For Iran: Georgian university diplomas of Iranian graduates for Ministry of Science recognition, Georgian marriage certificates for registration in Iran, birth certificates of children born in Georgia for shenasnameh issuance at the embassy, Georgian court decisions.

Afghanistan and Dari documents

Afghan citizens in Georgia - students, humanitarian arrivals and families - hold documents in Dari and Pashto: the tazkira (identity document, in paper and electronic form), marriage documents (nikah khat), school and university certificates, and police documents where obtainable. Afghanistan is not a Hague member, and the legalization chain runs through the Afghan Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Georgian mission accredited to Afghanistan, or, where the current situation makes this impossible, Georgian offices have in some cases accepted alternative verification; we advise on what is currently practicable for each document and office. Our Persian team translates Dari with attention to its vocabulary and to Afghan document formats, and Pashto through partner translators. Electronic tazkiras with QR codes are translated including the verification data.

Timing, validity and common errors

The Iranian chain - official translation, Ministry of Justice, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Georgian embassy - takes one to three weeks in Tehran when done by a representative, longer from the provinces; the reverse chain through the Georgian MFA and the Iranian embassy in Tbilisi takes one to two weeks. Translation in Tbilisi is 1-2 hours and is started from a scan while the chain runs. The police clearance certificate has a short validity and Georgian practice treats one older than a few months with suspicion, so time it to arrive legalized close to the application date. The errors we correct most often are a diploma legalized without the prior Ministry of Science confirmation, a shenasnameh legalized on the wrong pages (all pages with entries must be included), a name in one Latin spelling on the passport and another on the official translation, a Hijri date converted incorrectly, and a bundle unstapled for scanning, which both countries' offices treat as invalid. Send photos of every page of every document and we run this check before anything is submitted.

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