Getting married in Albania

[christine44]

Hello,

I am British (and living in the UK) and am planning to marry my Albanian boyfriend in Albania (he is currently living in Italy). I would be grateful for any advice regarding the documentation needed and the procedure we need to follow. After we are married he will still need to take the English Language test before he can apply for the Visa, so at the moment I am focussing on what we need to do to get married and we will tackle the Visa requirements at a later date. We are so overwhelmed by the whole thing that we need to just take one step at a time.

I have looked on various websites and believe that I will need to obtain (1) a Certificate of No Impediment from my local council, and send this along with (2) a certified copy of my full Birth Certificate and (3) my Decree Absolute, to the legalisation office in Milton Keynes to be legalised with an apostle stamp.

After this I am a bit confused on the following points, as I have read contradictory posts on this forum regarding the following:

1) Do any or all 3 documents need to be translated into Albanian ?
2) Do any or all 3 documents need to be legalised by the Albanian Ministry of Foreign Affairs through the Albanian Postal Service (Posta Shqiptare) if they have been legalised in the UK ?
3) How much notice do we need to give in Albania to book a wedding date at a registry office ?
4) Does the registry office need my documents at the time of booking the wedding date ?

I would be very grateful if you could provide answers to my questions or for any information or advice you can offer.

Thank you