Pakistan: science textbooks to be translated into Urdu

(IANS) The Urdu language has long been associated with poetry and literature in India. But now it will also be a medium of learning science in schools and madrassas, thanks to the Aligarh Muslim University (AMU). AMU has decided to translate science textbooks prescribed by various education boards of the country – like the CBSE, [...]

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Western Australia: No funds allocated to establish an interpreter service

The Western Australian Government has confirmed no funds have been allocated to establish an interpreter service in WA and says it will now hand the issue to the Federal Government.In November 2006, Attorney-General Jim McGinty promised to inject resources into Aboriginal interpreter services, acknowledging that Indigenous people were not adequately represented in courts.The Equal Opportunity [...]

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UK: Spending on interpreters has quadrupled since 2002

Police learn the lingo to combat immigrant crime
So many crimes are being committed by eastern European migrants that police officers are being sent on courses to learn Polish and Russian. Cambridgeshire police has paid for 50 of its staff to attend language schools because dealing with foreign suspects takes up to three times longer [...]

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Scotland: Justice system compromised by unqualified interpreters

Justice system compromised by unqualified interpreters
Fears of miscarriages in cases involving migrants

SCOTLAND COULD be seeing miscarriages of justice because sheriff clerks and procurators fiscal are using unqualified linguists as interpreters for migrant defendants and witnesses in the courts, the Sunday Herald can reveal. The Scottish Court Service and Crown Office are allowing foreign students [...]

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Health Foundation funds training for interpreters of medical conversations for refugees

Greater Rochester Health Foundation announces $8.2 million in grants
The first set of dollars doled out by one of Rochester’s wealthiest private foundations funded about a dozen fitness and nutrition programs aimed at driving down childhood obesity, providing vaccinations for thousands of teens, training translators how to interpret medical conversations for refugees, offering home health services [...]

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Community must bridge language divide
In Washington city, it’s English or Spanish
Nearly everyone in this small farming community in eastern Washington speaks Spanish – nearly everyone except those in city government and the police department, where English is spoken.

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And almost everyone who speaks one language does not speak the other. It is a [...]

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Minnesota: Budget cuts hit court interpreters

State ax falls on judicial budgets
The Minnesota Legislature finished the 2008 session last week with a resounding reduction to several state programs as a way to handle a $935 million deficit without raising taxes. Public safety took a $10.2 million cut in the process. The state’s court system was reduced by $4 million. The Department [...]

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Iowa: Court translators give voice to due process

Translators give voice to due process

Court translators uphold the constitutional rights of defendants who otherwise wouldn’t understand their legal rights or be able to aid in their own defenses. “The job is interesting and beautiful when you see that person’s eyes light up and they know,” Carrie Lilley of Boston said. Translators are “performance artists,” [...]

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ISO9001:2000 Quality Management System procedure translated into Arabic

Dubai Schools Agency undertakes quality assessment in Arabic
Dubai’s Knowledge and Human Development Authority (KHDA) is making history as it undertakes an international quality assessment entirely in Arabic.
For the first time ever, the world-recognised ISO9001:2000 Quality Management System procedure has been translated from English into Arabic – in-house at KHDA – and its training programme is [...]

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FBI lacks Arabic translators

The FBI lacks agents fluent in Arabic and must undergo a review of its counter-insurgency program, a top official testified. Bassem Youssef, a chief in the FBI’s Communications Analysis Unit, said the agency has refused to hirer train agents fluent in Arabic. In written testimony to the House Judiciary Subcommittee, Youssef, a 20-year veteran, appealed [...]

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