Dad is dual ROC / US citizen (though his passport is expired).
Mom is US citizen (renounced PRC).
They were married in PRC and have a PRC marriage certificate. I tried contacting TECO SF regarding how to authenticate their marriage certificate for my passport application, and was told I need to get it authenticated by both 海協會 ( CHINA) and 海基會 (TAIWAN).
I’m not sure how to proceed. These entities are in PRC and ROC respectively. Why wouldn’t the PRC Consulate and TECO SF be able to authenticate a PRC marriage certificate?
Welcome to the awesome world of notarization in Taiwan. Basically, in 1961, a bunch of countries got together and said “this thing where we need to stamp documents in multiple countries in order to use them in a particular country is ridiculous, let’s not do that anymore”. Neither China nor Taiwan signed up to that deal. So, according to their respective national laws, the embassies are not allowed to stamp documents that have not been previously stamped by the appropriate authority.
Need to go to the public notary in the province they were married in and ask them for a notarization that will be used in Taiwan. then you can pick it up in the cross straights office in Taipei in about two weeks. When you get it it will include a copy of the cert, a notarization by the provincial public authority, and a notarization by the Taiwan side of the cross straights bodies. Then it is good for use in all ROC agencies.
But is the PRC embassy and TECO not considered the appropriate authority of their respective countries? They officially represent PRC and ROC interests in the US.
Yea I did it. I did it in person, but I don’t know if it has to be done in person. I imagine that you can get someone to do it on your behalf. If you have a contact in the city your parents were married in I would ask them to go to the public notary with the original marriage cert and give it a try.
TECO said I need to send it to 海協會 in PRC (Cross Straights) as well. Is this inaccurate? I just need to get it notarized locally? I’m wondering why a marriage certificate needs to be notarized…
If I’m not there in person, I assume I would have my contact mail the marriage cert to 海基會 in Taipei?
Its actually not as complicated as it sounds really. In the regular public notary just ask for a notarization that can be used in Taiwan, then they will automatically sent it to the China side of the cross straits bodies, who then automatically send it to the Taiwan side, and you can pick it up in Taiwan directly. So you only have two points of contact.
No Idea, I can pm you the name of a law firm in Taiwan who do this kind of stuff if you like. They are not super cheap, which is why I didnt use them at the time. But they are cheaper than flying all over the place to do it yourself.
