Corlățean was born in Medgidia, and graduated from the University of Bucharest's Faculty of Law in 1994.

Between 1994 and 2001, Corlățean worked as a diplomat in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, before joining Prime Minister Adrian Năstase's Chancellery in 2001–2003 (first as Adviser on Foreign Policy Issues, and, after 2003, as Secretary of State for the Romanian Diaspora).

[3] He resigned from the latter position following the first round of the 2014 presidential election, in which he was blamed for not setting up enough polling places for the Romanian diaspora.

[4][5] In addition to his role in parliament, Corlățean has served as member of the Romanian delegation to the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe from 2009 until 2012 and since 2015.

He has been the Assembly's co-rapporteur on Georgia since 2018[7] (alongside Kerstin Lundgren and later Claude Kern)[8] and on the downing of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 since 2021.