Iran joins Electronic Communications Convention
Members of the Iranian Parliament have approved Iran’s membership in the United Nations Convention on the Use of Electronic Communications in International Contracts (the “Electronic Communications Convention”, or ECC).
Iran as a member of the United Nations Commission on International Trade Law (UNCITRAL) signed the Convention on the Use of Electronic Communications in International Contracts and joined the treaty as the 19th country after Russia, Azerbaijan, Singapore, and Bahrain, IRNA reported.
Adopted by the United Nations General Assembly on 23 November 2005, the United Nations Convention on the Use of Electronic Communications in International Contracts aims to enhance legal certainty and commercial predictability where electronic communications are used in relation to international contracts.
It addresses the determination of a party’s location in an electronic environment; the time and place of dispatch and receipt of electronic communications; the use of automated message systems for contract formation; and the criteria to be used for establishing functional equivalence between electronic communications and paper documents - including “original” paper documents - as well as between electronic authentication methods and hand-written signatures.
By establishing legal arrangements for Iran’s membership in the convention, a clear vision of the development of electronic documents between Iran and other member states would be created.