Pakistan's Foreign Ministry hosted a ceremony to mark the Islamic Republic's accession to the 1961 Hague Convention Abolishing the Requirement of Legalization for Foreign Public Documents (Apostille Convention), Radio Pakistan reported.
The Convention officially entered into force for the Islamic Republic of Pakistan on March 9, 2023. However, at first, official Islamabad could not decide on the apostille procedure for a long time, and then the residents of the republic faced corruption - huge queues, due to which it was possible to certify documents only through intermediaries at inflated prices. Now official Islamabad has launched a large-scale reform. The Pakistani authorities have completely eliminated the pre-registration system and announced that documents can be certified with an apostille in special legalization centers. Later, they introduced a service for delivering documents for apostille through specially authorized courier companies.
The launch of the new apostille scheme was accompanied by a ceremony presided over by Pakistan's Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Mohammad Ishaq Dar, with other officials from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Ministry of Information Technology and the National Information Technology Council also participating.
Speaking at the ceremony, Dar expressed the government's commitment to improving the quality of public services in the country and urged his subordinates to be more proactive in this regard.
It was also announced during the ceremony that online submission of Apostille applications through a dedicated app will become available in Pakistan from August 21, 2024.
