Documents Necessary for a Foreign Individual to File a Lawsuit

2020/1/8

When a foreigner files a lawsuit in China, it is difficult to understand what materials are required to sue in a Chinese court because of a language barrier. In this article, we briefly review the documents that need to be prepared for foreign customers.

Firstly, the individual plaintiff should submit the pleadings, the duplicate of passport translation, the necessary evidence and Power of Attorney when and if hiring a China lawyer. Any and all signature on the documents to be submitted to the court must be written by a black ink pen.

Secondly, unlike the Chinese citizen's lawsuit, the signature on all the documents should be notarized in his/her country and then attested by Chinese embassy in his/her country. All the evidence produced outside of China should be notarized and then attested in accordance with relevant laws.

Moreover, any and all the documents in foreign language must be translated into Chinese. The Beijing court demands the foreign language documents must be translated by one of five translation companies appointed by the Beijing Super Court.

The above is a brief summary. In fact, depending on the type of case and the complexity of the case, foreign parties need to submit more materials. Foreigners who file a lawsuit in China need to submit more materials than Chinese citizens, and Chinese law has mandated these materials. In order to avoid wasting too much time during the filing process, we recommend that foreign clients hire Chinese lawyers in advance, and Chinese lawyers will help organize the prosecution materials.