Legal status of Foreigners in International Civil Process: Experience of International Unification

Gennadii Tsirat, Doctor of Laws | JVS Law

On 1 August 2026 the 1980 Hague Convention on International Access to Justice entered into force for Ukraine. Parliament passed the accession law (No. 4820-IX) on 12 March 2026. Ukrainian nationals and residents may now obtain legal aid in the 28 other contracting states on the same terms as those states’ own nationals. Most of them are EU member states.

This paper was written in 2011 and closes with precisely the question that has just been answered: “Should Ukraine accede to the 1980 Convention, and what benefit would it bring?” Below is the answer the author gave then, and how it played out.

Published in the Bulletin of the Supreme Court of Ukraine, No. 9(133), 2011, pp. 44–48.

The baseline principle, now treated as settled, was put by German doctrine (H. Schack): a foreigner is entitled to free and unimpeded access to the courts on the same footing as nationals of that state — and that right does not depend on reciprocity.

The last clause is the operative one. National treatment is not a favour traded for a mirroring favour: a state grants it unilaterally because it is a standard, not a bargaining chip. The approach is reflected both in domestic law and in bilateral and multilateral treaties.

The Hague Conference on Private International Law has led the development of these approaches, focusing on the concrete aspects of access: security for costs, obtaining legal aid, and judicial documents.

The paper compares two conventions, and the distance between them shows where the idea of access to justice is heading.

The 1954 Convention worked with the notions of “need” and “free of charge”. Persons in need could obtain extracts from civil status records in other contracting states on equal terms with nationals, and free legalisation of documents required for marriage. But the rule applied only to nationals of contracting states.

The 1980 Convention abandoned those notions entirely:

• national treatment for all nationals and residents of contracting states, irrespective of means;
• a wider circle of covered persons;
• the link between legal assistance and its being free of charge was removed;
• a wider list of obtainable documents: not only civil status records but judgments in civil and commercial matters, plus legalisation.

Enforcement of costs orders was simplified too. Under the 1954 Convention an order for costs against the claimant was examined and declared enforceable without hearing the parties, subject to a right of appeal, with the enforcing court confined to a defined list of questions. The 1980 Convention leaves only two documents: a certified copy showing the decision is final and enforceable, and a certified translation where the decision is in another language. The list is exhaustive.

The paper’s principal conclusion concerns direction rather than any single instrument. The drafters of the 1980 Convention did not set out to move to a qualitatively new level — uniform rules establishing a single legal regime of access to justice for everyone. The conditions for that did not exist.

But the general trend, the author argued, should run:

from a regime of non-discrimination → through national treatment for foreigners → to uniform rules creating a single legal space.

Ukraine’s accession to the 1980 Convention is exactly the move from the first stage to the second — made fifteen years after the paper described it.

In 2011 Ukraine was party to the Hague Conventions of 1954, 1965 and 1970. The author raised the question of the 1980 Convention, and it stayed open for fifteen years.

• 12 March 2026 — Parliament adopted accession Law No. 4820-IX;
• 21 May 2026 — the instrument of accession was deposited;
• 1 August 2026 — the Convention entered into force for Ukraine.

What it means in practice. A Ukrainian national or resident bringing proceedings in any of the 28 other contracting states is entitled to legal aid on the same terms as a national of that state — without a reciprocity requirement and without regard to nationality. The mirror applies: nationals of those states get the same treatment in Ukraine.

Together with the 2005 Choice of Court Convention (in force 1 August 2023) and the 2019 Judgments Convention (1 September 2023), this completes the Hague chain for Ukraine: access to court → competent court → enforcement of the judgment.

Tsirat G. A. Legal Status of Foreigners in International Civil Procedure: Experience of International Unification // Bulletin of the Supreme Court of Ukraine. — 2011. — No. 9(133). — pp. 44–48. Full text in Ukrainian: original article (PDF, 5 pp.).