Apostille vs. Embassy legalisation for Iraq
Iraq has not joined the Hague Apostille Convention. That one line decides the shape of everything below it. Inside the treaty, a single certificate settles where a paper came from and every member state reads it the same way. Outside it, the older method survives: a chain of offices, each vouching for the mark before it, ending at a consular desk. The work is not hard to follow, but it is longer, and no choice of British office can shorten it.
Iraq's Hague status & what it means
It helps to see why the vocabulary matters so much. An apostille is a fixed certificate created by a treaty, and where the treaty does not reach, the word has nothing to attach itself to. A page, a form or a price list offering an apostille for Iraq is describing something that will not be accepted on arrival. Reading the far end's instruction literally, and repeating its wording back, is the cheapest error-check available on this road.
The Liverpool → Iraq route step by step
Two government offices carry the British end and they are not interchangeable. Liverpool Register Office at St George's Hall, St George's Place, Liverpool L1 1JJ issues certified copies of births, marriages and deaths, which is where a civil record should begin. The FCDO Legalisation Office handles the British certificate for the whole country and works entirely by post. A consular act then follows, and that is the stage which decides whether the file is finished.
Cost & timing for this route
Only the British figures are fixed here: £45 / document by standard post, or £40 / document on the next-day service open to registered businesses. Both are charged per sheet, so the length of your list is the size of that bill. Time behaves differently. A two-stage road is not twice as slow in any reliable way, because the stages queue independently, so treat the calendar as a range from the outset.