Law on Foreigners – Don’t Have Apostille? Forget About Foreign Workers

The Law on Foreigners has been in effect since the first day of this year and includes a number of changes compared to the previous law of the same name. One of these changes is a new condition – that the foreign worker (a citizen of a third country) has not been convicted of a criminal offense (in jargon, this is a certificate of no criminal record). In practice, this new condition also means new administrative procedures – obstacles that did not exist before. Firstly, it involves the translation of the certificate of no criminal record into Croatian by a court interpreter and, secondly, the so-called apostille or certification of the mentioned certificate. At the urging of the Croatian Employers’ Association, an internal instruction was issued stating that there is no need for translation if the certificate is issued in an international (i.e., commonly accepted, globally recognized) format and in English, as well as if it is issued in a language that is related to Croatian and in Latin script (e.g., BiH, Serbia, Montenegro…).

Considering that in many countries around the world from which foreign workers come to work in Croatia, it has become customary to issue such certificates for abroad written in English and in an acceptable format, the first condition is relatively easy to fulfill, regardless of whether the foreign worker comes from Serbia or Thailand.

Example of an Impossible Mission

HUP has very thoroughly explained the problem in its communication with the relevant authorities (Croatian Employment Service, Ministry of the Interior, Ministry of Labor, Pension System, Family and Social Policy) and informed its members about the actions taken, making it accessible to many, including us. An example of a trading company that operates in tourism and is active in 11 countries on three continents has been described. Many employers, including large ones, turn to this company to improve the level of their services to tourists, with the most common requests for animators, masseurs, head chefs, etc. According to the applicable Law on Foreigners, to obtain a work permit for a foreigner from Thailand, it is necessary to obtain a certificate of no criminal record from the police in Bangkok (the capital of Thailand), where the Ministry of Foreign Affairs is located, which certifies the certificate.

The Republic of Croatia does not have an embassy in the Kingdom of Thailand, and these matters for the Kingdom of Thailand are handled by the Croatian embassy in Indonesia (Jakarta). There are three hours of flight between Jakarta and Bangkok, and since Bangkok has been in complete lockdown since April 26, there is objectively no possibility of going to the Croatian embassy.

It Is Possible to Do It Differently

Therefore, it is necessary to take an alternative route: after obtaining the certificate of no criminal record from the police in Bangkok, after that certificate has been certified at the local Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and after the certificate has been translated from Thai to Croatian by an official translator, it is necessary to go to Budapest, where the embassy of the Kingdom of Thailand is located (Hungary is closed to foreigners who have a quarantine obligation lasting 10 days). Only after that does a visit to the Ministry of Foreign and European Affairs of the Republic of Croatia follow.

Of course, the question arises as to why we even need an apostille. This is an obligation arising from the Law on the Legalization of Documents in International Traffic, and it is important to know that an international agreement was signed back in 1961 – the Hague Convention on the Abolition of the Requirement of Legalization of Foreign Public Documents, which has been in force in the Republic of Croatia since 1993. This convention (which has a supranational force for the states that have accepted it) has Article 3, paragraphs 1 and 2, which states: ‘If there is a need for the legalization of public documents – certification of the authenticity of signatures, attributes, seals, stamps on public documents, instead of the legalization of the document, an apostille may be affixed. However, the formality mentioned in the previous paragraph cannot be required if it has been abolished, simplified, or if such a document is exempt from legalization by laws, regulations, or customs in force in the state where the document is presented or by an agreement between two or more states.’

The Damage Is Enormous

Therefore, HUP is completely right when it claims that Croatia has been and remains free to abolish the obligation of apostille; it was only an option, not an obligation. Unfortunately, we did not utilize that option in such a way that we stipulated in the Law on Foreigners that apostille is not necessary, but we created a problem at levels lower than the legislator, at a classic bureaucratic level that, due to its slow operation, practically rejects any request for which speed of resolution is essential. Therefore, it is crucial that this bad practice is immediately stopped and that, if not permanently, at least during the COVID-19 pandemic, apostille for certificates of no criminal record is not required.

In the case we are dealing with, it is evident that the so-called lower levels have decided to ignore the context in which foreign workers in Croatia have long not been predominantly from neighboring countries, where we have long had many foreign workers from China, the Philippines, Thailand, etc. Those who may be against HUP’s request should publicly come forward and prove that it is not a problem for us to jeopardize GDP because thousands of foreigners will not come to work in Croatia or will come after a long wait during which their potential employer has likely failed because he could not fulfill the contract without workers.

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