NEWS / Apostille Convention to Take Effect in Rwanda in June

Rwanda is set to start accepting documents legalized with an Apostille on June 5, 2024. The change comes as a result of the African’s nation accession to the Convention of October 5th, 1961 Abolishing the Requirement of Legalization of Foreign Public Documents, known as the Hague or Apostille Convention, on October 6 last year.

Rwanda’s accession to the Convention means that there are now 126 member states. At this point, almost two thirds (2/3) of United Nations member states are Convention member-states, with the list continuing to grow every year. Last year, notable additions included China and Canada.

Accession to the Convention considerably simplifies the process of legalizing public documents, i.e. notarized documents or documents issued and signed by a government official, such as vital records, corporate certificates, and court filings. In order for a given document issued in one member state to be valid in another, it is sufficient to obtain an Apostille Certificate for it. The Apostille confirms the authority of the specific government official or notary whose signature appears on that document.

In most countries, Apostilles are issues by the respective Ministry that supervises the official or notary signing the document. In the United States, Apostilles are generally issued by the individual US States depending on where the document was originally issued or notarized.

Rwanda was formally proposed as a member state by the government of the Netherlands, whose foreign ministry is the official depository of the Apostille Convention. The Secretary of the Hague Conference on Private International Law (HCCH) then initiated a 6-month voting process during which all current member states voted on Rwanda’s membership. Since a majority of votes had been cast, Rwanda was invited to join the Convention. A formal ceremony attended by HCCH Secretary General Christophe Bernasconi, Rwandan Ambassador to the Netherlands Olivier Jean Patrick Nduhungirehe, and several other Rwandan and HCCH officials.

Until June 6, one would still need to undergo the chain legalization process to legalize US-issued documents for use in Rwanda. This would mean getting authentication certificates from the state and federal government before submitting the authenticated document in question to the Rwandan embassy for legalization.

A&M Logos International is here to assist you the obtaining apostilles for use in Rwanda and any other Apostille Convention member state. We work with documents from all 50 states and can get them ready for use in any country in the world. If the country is not a member of the Convention, we can get the document authenticated and legalized with the embassy of that country. Call us today at (212) 233-7061 or e-mail us at info@apostille.us. You can also apply on our website.