A claim form issued in the High Court in London names a distributor based in Izmir. A commercial action in the Court of Session in Edinburgh needs the evidence of a former manager who now lives in Antalya. A dispute before the High Court in Belfast depends on delivery records held by a logistics company near Bursa. Each time, proceedings in one of the three UK legal systems have to reach into Türkiye, and from that point Turkish law and treaty law decide how papers are served and how evidence is gathered.
Two layers of treaty law apply. The older one is a bilateral convention on legal proceedings signed in Ankara in 1931. The newer one is the pair of Hague Conventions on service abroad and on taking evidence abroad, which both states have ratified. The layers overlap without cancelling each other. Under the Hague Service Convention, Türkiye has also declared its opposition to some routes, such as postal service, that the Convention leaves open where the destination state does not object.
This guide sets out what each text provides, how a Turkish court handles a request from the UK, and what Turkish data protection and bank secrecy rules mean for disclosure. The readers we have in mind are solicitors, barristers and advocates in any of the three UK jurisdictions whose case has a Turkish element, the parties they act for, and businesses or individuals in Türkiye to whom UK court papers have been delivered. Lex Lata advises on Turkish law only; the procedural rules of each UK system are for counsel qualified there.
The 1931 convention: a bilateral text that is still listed
The Convention regarding Legal Proceedings in Civil and Commercial Matters was signed at Angora (Ankara) on 28 November 1931. Türkiye approved it by Law No. 2045, published in the Official Gazette (Resmî Gazete) No. 2142 of 5 July 1932; the Turkish Ministry of Justice refers to it as the “Müzahereti Adliye Mukavelenamesi”. Ratifications were exchanged in London on 12 April 1933, and a supplementary convention was signed in Ankara on 10 February 1939.
As signed, the convention covered England and Wales. Article 17(a) stated that it would not apply of itself to Scotland or Northern Ireland but could be extended to them by notification. The UK Treaty Series index records the extension to Northern Ireland as effective from 7 September 1933 and to Scotland from 30 September 1933, so the text now reaches all three UK legal systems.
It applies only to civil and commercial matters, including non-contentious matters (Article 1(1)), and deals with four subjects:
- service of judicial and extra-judicial documents (Articles 2 to 6);
- taking of evidence (Articles 7 to 11);
- for subjects or citizens of each state, a perfect equality of treatment with the other state’s own subjects or citizens as regards security for costs, orders for costs, free judicial assistance and imprisonment for debt (Article 12);
- enforcement of judgments for costs against a person who was exempted from giving security for costs under Article 12 (Article 13).
It does not provide for the recognition or enforcement of court judgments in general, and no treaty between the UK and Türkiye does so for civil and commercial judgments as a whole. That subject is covered in our guide to enforcing a UK court judgment in Türkiye.
Is the convention still in force? The FCDO’s list of bilateral treaties on civil procedure, published on gov.uk, includes it together with the 1939 supplement. The Turkish Ministry of Justice’s page on bilateral treaties states that it exists, and Türkiye’s information filed with the Hague Conference on Private International Law (HCCH) lists it as a bilateral channel for service. We found no record of termination in these sources.
How the Hague Conventions sit next to the 1931 text
For the UK, the Hague Service Convention of 1965 took effect on 10 February 1969; for Türkiye, on 28 April 1972. The Hague Evidence Convention of 1970 took effect for the UK on 14 September 1976 and for Türkiye on 12 October 2004, which is the date from which it applies between the two. Each state joined both conventions by ratification.
Each Hague text has a clause on other treaties. Article 25 of the Service Convention provides that, without prejudice to its Articles 22 and 24 (which concern the earlier Hague conventions on civil procedure of 1905 and 1954), the Convention “shall not derogate from Conventions containing provisions on the matters governed by this Convention” to which the Contracting States are, or shall become, parties. Article 32 of the Evidence Convention says the same for evidence, without prejudice to its Articles 29 and 31. Article 11 of the Service Convention adds that states may agree to permit other channels of transmission, and Article 28 of the Evidence Convention allows agreements derogating from certain of its provisions.
Türkiye’s practical information on the HCCH website, under the heading on derogatory channels (Articles 11, 19, 24 and 25 of the Service Convention), lists the convention with the United Kingdom of 28 November 1931, Articles 2 to 6. The page was last updated in June 2022 and carries HCCH’s general note that the information may not be complete.
Read together, the texts give a UK claimant more than one treaty route into Türkiye. They do not say which route a UK court should prefer; that is a matter for the procedural rules of England and Wales, Scotland or Northern Ireland. What Turkish law controls is how service and evidence are carried out inside Türkiye, and how a Turkish court later looks at what was done.
Serving a claim form in Türkiye: what each text offers
Article 2 of the 1931 convention lets the party interested, at its option, have documents served in any of the ways provided in Articles 3, 5 and 6. The Hague Service Convention adds its own Central Authority route.
The consular request route (1931 convention, Article 3)
Under Article 3(a), a request for service in Türkiye is addressed by a British consular officer to the Governor of the province in which the consulate is situated, for transmission to the appropriate Turkish authorities. Article 3(b) sets the form. The request names the authority from which the document comes, the parties, the recipient with his address, and the nature of the document, and it is drawn up in Turkish. The document itself must be in Turkish or accompanied by a Turkish translation, certified as correct by the consular officer who sent the request or by an official or sworn translator of either country.
The competent Turkish authority serves the document in the manner Turkish law prescribes for similar documents or, if the request asks for it, in a special form that is not incompatible with that law (Article 3(c)). Türkiye may refuse to execute the request only if it considers that execution would compromise its sovereignty or safety (Article 3(d)). Proof of service is a certificate from the Turkish authority setting out the fact, the manner and the date of service; the document and any translation are sent in duplicate (Article 3(e)).
Turkish domestic law also has a general provision on documents that foreign missions send for service. Article 26 of the Notification Law No. 7201 (Tebligat Kanunu) provides that, subject to the provisions of agreements and to reciprocity, documents for service on persons resident in Türkiye that a foreign embassy, or a foreign consulate through the governorship (valilik) of its district, delivers to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs are sent through the relevant ministry to the competent authority, and returned certified through the same channels once service is done. Article 26 does not name the 1931 convention; it states that the provisions of agreements are reserved.
British consuls and the post (1931 convention, Articles 5 and 6)
Article 5 lets British diplomatic or consular officers serve a document, without compulsion and without the intervention of Turkish authorities, but only on a recipient who is a British subject or citizen. Even then, the document must be in Turkish or accompanied by a Turkish translation. Türkiye’s declaration under Article 8 of the Hague Service Convention points the same way: foreign diplomatic or consular agents may serve only their own nationals in Türkiye.
Article 6 allows service by post where the law of the sending country permits this method, again only if the recipient is a subject or citizen of the sending state. On their terms, neither Article 5 nor Article 6 reaches a Turkish company or a Turkish national; for them, the 1931 route is Article 3. The text does not deal with a recipient who holds both British and Turkish nationality, so a dual national calls for care before Article 5 or 6 is relied on.
The Central Authority route (Hague Service Convention)
Requests under the Convention go to the Directorate General for Foreign Relations and EU Affairs at the Ministry of Justice in Ankara, which Türkiye designated as its Central Authority. Article 45(1)(c) of Presidential Decree No. 1 assigns this unit international judicial assistance in civil and criminal matters and names service (tebligat) and letters of request (istinabe) expressly.
On the UK side, HCCH’s practical information names the forwarding authorities under Article 3(1): the Senior Master of the Royal Courts of Justice for England and Wales; the Scottish Government’s Central Authority and International Law Team, and the Society of Messengers-at-Arms and Sheriff Officers, for Scotland; and the Master (King’s Bench and Appeals) in Belfast for Northern Ireland. The request follows the model form annexed to the Convention, needs no legalisation, and the request and the document are both furnished in duplicate (Article 3).
Translation decides how firm the service is. According to Türkiye’s practical information, documents in Turkish, or accompanied by a Turkish translation, are served under Article 5(1) by the Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office through post offices under Turkish law, and may then be served against the addressee’s will. Without a translation, the papers go out under Article 5(2) as a delivery that the addressee is free to refuse because no translation is attached. The executed request comes back with a certificate stating the method, place and date of service and the person to whom the document was delivered, or the reasons that prevented service (Article 6). Article 9 also lets a state use consular channels to forward documents to the authorities the other state has designated, and diplomatic channels in exceptional circumstances.
What Turkish domestic law adds
Turkish internal law on service is the Notification Law, which by Article 1 governs all service by judicial authorities, electronic service included. Service on a legal person is made to its authorised representatives, and to only one of them if there are several (Article 12(1)). If neither the addressee nor anyone else who may receive service under the Law is at the address, or the person refuses to accept, the officer hands the document against signature to the headman (muhtar) or a member of the council of elders of the area, or to police officers, and fixes a notice to the door of the building; the date the notice is fixed is deemed to be the date of service (Article 21(1)).
Article 7/a makes electronic service compulsory for, among others, all private law legal persons. Türkiye’s HCCH information describes service of incoming requests through post offices and does not address the electronic route.
Post, couriers and local agents
Türkiye’s declaration of 28 February 1972 opposes the methods of service set out in Article 10 of the Hague Service Convention, and its HCCH practical information marks sub-paragraphs (a), (b) and (c) one by one as an opposition. Sending a claim form by registered post to a defendant in Türkiye is a postal channel under Article 10(a). Delivery by a courier company or by an agent instructed locally leaves the Central Authority out altogether and belongs to the family of direct methods to which Türkiye’s Article 10 objection is addressed. The 1931 convention allows post only under Article 6, to British subjects or citizens, and says nothing of couriers or private agents.
Whether a UK court will accept another method is a question of UK law. The Turkish question comes later. MÖHUK, the Code on Private International and Procedural Law No. 5718, makes it a condition of enforcement in Article 54(1)(ç) that the person against whom enforcement is sought has not objected, before the Turkish court, that under the laws of the place of judgment he was not duly summoned to or not represented before the court that gave it, or that judgment was given in default or in his absence contrary to those laws. The same condition applies to recognition (Article 58(1)). The Turkish court decides such an objection on the file before it, so the way the papers reached the defendant becomes part of a record that may be examined years later.
| Route | Source | Who it can reach | Language | Point to watch |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Consular request to the provincial Governor | 1931 convention, Art. 3 | Anyone in Türkiye | Turkish, or certified Turkish translation | Refusal only on sovereignty or safety grounds |
| Service by a British consul | 1931 convention, Art. 5; Hague Service Art. 8 | British subjects or citizens only | Turkish, or Turkish translation | No compulsion |
| Post | 1931 convention, Art. 6 | British subjects or citizens, where UK law permits post | Not addressed in Art. 6 | Türkiye opposes Hague Art. 10(a); objection risk at enforcement |
| Central Authority request | Hague Service Arts. 2 to 6 | Anyone in Türkiye | Turkish for service under Art. 5(1) | Untranslated papers may be refused |
| Letter of request | 1931 convention, Art. 8; Hague Evidence Chapter I | Witnesses and holders of documents | Turkish, or certified Turkish translation | Turkish court applies Turkish procedure; no pre-trial discovery (Hague Art. 23) |
| Evidence before a British consul | 1931 convention, Art. 10; Hague Evidence Art. 15 | British subjects or citizens | Requests to appear in Turkish or translated (1931, Art. 10(c)) | No compulsory powers |
Witnesses and documents in Türkiye for proceedings in the UK
Article 7 of the 1931 convention lets a court in one state that orders evidence to be taken in the other use either of the ways in Articles 8 and 10. The Hague Evidence Convention offers letters of request (Chapter I) and evidence taken by diplomatic officers, consular agents and commissioners (Chapter II).
Letters of request under the 1931 convention
A court may, in accordance with its own law, address a letter of request to the competent authority in the other state asking it to undertake a judicial enquiry (Article 8(a)). The letter is drawn up in Turkish or accompanied by a Turkish translation certified by a British diplomatic or consular officer or by an official or sworn translator of either country (Article 8(b)). In Türkiye it travels the same way as a service request: a British consular officer sends it to the Governor of the province where the consulate is situated, for transmission to the appropriate Turkish authorities (Article 8(c)).
The Turkish court must give effect to the letter using the same compulsory measures as for a commission or order from its own authorities (Article 8(d)). If the consular officer who transmitted it so wishes, he is told the date and place of the proceedings so that the interested parties may be present or represented (Article 8(e)). Execution may be refused only if the authenticity of the request is not established, if executing it is not a judicial function in Türkiye, or if Türkiye considers that it would affect its sovereignty or safety (Article 8(f)). The Turkish court applies Turkish procedure, but a request that a special procedure be followed is to be granted if that procedure is not incompatible with Turkish law (Article 8(i)).
Requests under the 1970 Hague Evidence Convention
Türkiye made a reservation under Article 33: letters of request to be executed under Chapter I must be in Turkish or come with a Turkish translation. A translation is certified by a diplomatic officer or consular agent, a sworn translator or any other person so authorised in either state (Article 4(5)). The executing court applies its own law as to methods and procedure but follows a request for a special method unless it is incompatible with internal law or impossible to perform (Article 9), and it applies the measures of compulsion its internal law provides (Article 10).
Türkiye has also declared under Article 23 that letters of request issued for the purpose of obtaining pre-trial discovery of documents as known in common law countries will not be executed, and HCCH records this as a full exclusion. The UK made its own Article 23 declaration, described in the last section below.
Türkiye’s practical information also describes the hearing. Domestic rules on evidence are in Articles 187 to 293 of the Code of Civil Procedure No. 6100 (HMK). A list of questions is preferred. Hearings are open to the public unless the judge orders otherwise under the applicable law. An oath is generally administered; under HMK Article 257(1), persons who have not completed fifteen years of age at the time they are heard, and persons whose power of discernment is not sufficient to grasp the nature and importance of the oath, are heard without one. What the witness says goes into minutes, which are read back and signed by witness, judge and clerk.
Witnesses before a British consul or a commissioner
Under Article 10 of the 1931 convention, a British diplomatic or consular officer may take evidence in Türkiye without the intervention of Turkish authorities. He may ask named individuals to appear, produce documents and take an oath, provided they are British subjects or citizens, but he has no compulsory powers. Requests to appear are drawn up in Turkish or accompanied by a translation, the evidence may be taken under the procedure of the country where it will be used, and the parties may be present or represented by anyone competent to act before the courts of either country. If a witness refuses, a later application under Article 8 remains open (Article 11).
Under the Hague Evidence Convention, Türkiye’s information marks Articles 15, 16 and 17 as applicable. Evidence of British nationals before a British consul falls under Article 15. Evidence of Turkish or third-country nationals before a consul (Article 16), or of anyone before a commissioner (Article 17), needs permission from the Ministry of Justice, which Türkiye designated as the competent authority. Türkiye has made no declaration under Article 18, so the Convention gives a consul or commissioner no route to ask Turkish authorities for assistance to obtain evidence by compulsion.
How a Turkish court treats witnesses and documents
A person summoned as a witness must attend, subject to the provisions of law, and a witness duly summoned who stays away without giving a reason is brought by force and ordered to pay the costs caused and a disciplinary fine (HMK Article 245(1)). A person called as a witness may refuse to testify in the cases the law expressly provides (Article 247(1)), and under Article 11 of the Hague Evidence Convention a privilege or duty to refuse under the law of the requesting state also counts if it is specified in the letter or confirmed by the requesting authority.
Documents are handled one at a time. The parties must produce all documents in their hands on which they or the other side rely as evidence (Article 219(1)). Where the court is satisfied that a document in the other party’s hands is necessary to prove a point and that the request is lawful, and the document’s possession or existence is shown in one of the ways Article 220(1) lists, it gives a definite period for production. If the party does not produce it and shows no acceptable excuse within that period, or denies having it and does not accept or take the oath offered, the court may, depending on the case, accept the other party’s statement about its content (Article 220(3)). A third person or an institution holding a document is ordered to produce it once the court decides that the document is necessary to prove a point raised by the parties (Article 221(1)). Foreign-language documents are filed with a translation by the party relying on them, and the court may require an official translation (Article 223).
For UK practitioners, the practical lesson is to ask for particular documents, identified as precisely as possible, and to link each one to the point it is meant to prove.
Before files leave Türkiye: personal data and bank customer secrets
Files gathered in Türkiye for UK proceedings, whether produced voluntarily by a group company or collected by a party, usually contain personal data: names, email addresses, telephone numbers, salaries, account details. Article 9 of the Personal Data Protection Law No. 6698 (KVKK), in the form in force since 1 June 2024, governs their transfer abroad.
The article works in three tiers. First, a transfer is allowed where a processing condition in Article 5 or 6 exists and there is an adequacy decision for the destination country, sectors within it or the international organisation (Article 9(1)). Adequacy decisions are made by the Personal Data Protection Board and published in the Official Gazette (Article 9(2)), so check whether one covers the UK at the time of the transfer. Second, where there is no adequacy decision, three things must come together: a processing condition in Article 5 or 6, the data subject’s ability to exercise his rights and seek effective remedies in the destination country, and one of the appropriate safeguards in Article 9(4), provided by the parties: an agreement, not in the nature of an international treaty, between public institutions or international organisations abroad and Turkish public institutions or public professional organisations, with Board permission; binding corporate rules approved by the Board; a standard contract announced by the Board; or a written undertaking containing provisions that ensure adequate protection, with Board permission. Third, only where neither exists, a transfer may be made on an incidental basis in one of the cases in Article 9(6), such as one necessary for the establishment, exercise or protection of a right (Article 9(6)(d)). Provisions in other laws on transfers abroad are reserved (Article 9(10)).
The exemption in Article 28(1)(d) covers processing by judicial authorities or enforcement authorities in connection with investigation, prosecution, trial or enforcement. It is defined by the authority doing the processing, and a company in Türkiye collecting its own files for a UK case is not such an authority.
Bank records carry a further layer. Article 73(3) of the Banking Law No. 5411 binds anyone who learns secrets of banks or their customers through their status and duties: they may disclose them only to authorities expressly empowered by law. Information that is a customer secret cannot be shared with, or transferred to, third parties inside or outside Türkiye unless the customer requests or instructs it, and explicit consent given under KVKK does not replace that request or instruction; the exceptions listed in the article and the mandatory provisions of other laws are reserved.
Our guide on KVKK for foreign companies covers the wider framework, and our personal data protection practice page describes the work involved.
Holding papers from a UK court in Türkiye: first checks
For a company or individual in Türkiye, the first useful step is to record how the papers came: through the public prosecutor and the post office, through a consular request and the governorship, by post or courier, or by hand. Keep the full set of papers, the envelope and any Turkish service report, and note whether a Turkish translation came with them. Under Türkiye’s Hague information, papers served under Article 5(2) without a translation may be refused, while translated papers served under Article 5(1) may be served against the addressee’s will.
Deadlines for acknowledging, defending or answering the claim are set by the rules of the UK system that issued the papers, which differ between England and Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, so a solicitor or advocate qualified there should look at them early. The Turkish questions are whether service respected the treaties and Türkiye’s declarations, what KVKK and bank secrecy allow to be disclosed, and whether an objection under MÖHUK Article 54(1)(ç) should be kept open for any later enforcement or recognition proceedings in Türkiye. Some of these disputes begin with an unpaid supply contract; our guide for UK exporters recovering unpaid invoices from Turkish buyers looks at that side of the file.
When a Turkish court needs a witness or document in the UK
A Turkish court that needs a witness or a document in the UK issues a letter of request (istinabe), and the Ministry of Justice’s Directorate General for Foreign Relations and EU Affairs handles international letters of request under Article 45(1)(c) of Presidential Decree No. 1. Under the 1931 convention, a letter for England is transmitted by the Turkish Consul in London to the Senior Master (Article 8(c)). Under the Hague Evidence Convention, letters go to the UK Central Authorities: the Senior Master (Foreign Process Section) for England and Wales, the Scottish Government Justice Directorate for Scotland and the Master (King’s Bench and Appeals) for Northern Ireland. A letter must be in the language of the authority requested to execute it or come with a translation into that language (Article 4), and the UK reserved under Article 33 that it will not accept a letter in French, so a Turkish letter needs an English translation.
In the UK, the Evidence (Proceedings in Other Jurisdictions) Act 1975 governs execution. Under section 1, the High Court, the Court of Session or the High Court of Justice in Northern Ireland has the powers conferred by the Act where it is satisfied that the application is made in pursuance of a request issued by or on behalf of a court or tribunal outside the UK, and that the evidence is to be obtained for civil proceedings instituted before that court or whose institution before it is contemplated. Section 2 lets the UK court order, among other things, the examination of witnesses and the production of documents. Section 2(4) bars an order requiring a person to state what documents relevant to the proceedings are or have been in his possession, custody or power, or to produce documents other than particular documents specified in the order as appearing to the court to be, or to be likely to be, in his possession, custody or power. Section 3 protects a person from being compelled to give evidence he could not be compelled to give in civil proceedings in that part of the UK or, under the conditions in section 3(2), in the requesting country. The UK’s Article 23 declaration under the Hague Evidence Convention uses the same two limbs.
Lex Lata and UK files: language, time zones and authority to act
Lex Lata works with solicitors, barristers and advocates across the UK, with the parties they represent, and with companies in Türkiye holding UK court papers, on the Turkish law questions these files raise. The work includes checking which treaty route fits the recipient, arranging Turkish translations by sworn translators, following requests inside Türkiye, attending hearings where a Turkish court executes a letter of request, advising on KVKK and bank secrecy before documents leave Türkiye, and assessing service with later enforcement in mind. Our commercial litigation and arbitration practice page gives more detail.
Work is done in English, by email and video call. Istanbul is on UTC+3 all year, so London is two hours behind Istanbul in British Summer Time and three hours behind in winter. Where Lex Lata has to act before a Turkish court for a UK client, a power of attorney is needed; our guide on powers of attorney and apostille from the UK explains how one is prepared in the UK for use in Türkiye. Questions of UK law and UK tax belong to a UK-qualified adviser.
For an overview of our work with clients across the UK, see Lawyer in Türkiye for UK clients. The contact page is the way to reach us about a specific file.
