Lubanga Trial Suspended over Transcription Errors

The Thomas Lubanga Dyilo case at the International Criminal Court in The Hague has been suspended over questions about the transcripts.  The court operates simultaneously in French, English, and whatever language a witness is testifying in.  The court reporters maintain transcripts in English and French based on the translations offered by the interpreters, both the French and English transcripts are intended to be authoritative.

Today, however, the court stopped the proceedings because of differences between the two official transcripts.  The defense noted differences between the French and English transcripts and asked the court to determine which accurately reflected the testimony given.  Most of the testimony was given in closed session so there is no public record of the errors.  One of the problems noticed was that the French transcript  contained the names of two persons named by a witness while the English transcript had only one.

A description of the proceedings is available here.  Lubanga is the first person to face trial at the ICC, he is accused of using child soldiers in his Union of Congolese Patriots army in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

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5 Trackbacks

  1. [...] previously stopped because of reported errors in translation and transcription which was blogged here, and by the Open Society Institute blog [...]

  2. [...] its case in January, 2010. The Lubanga trial has previously been suspended several times, twice  for transcription errors, for the appeals chamber to consider adding additional charges, and for the [...]

  3. By Warcrimesreparations on October 29, 2010 at 6:03 am

    Warcrimesreparations…

    [...] something about warcrimesreparations[...]…

  4. [...] and for other reasons throughout the trial, failure to disclose evidence by the prosecution, transcription and translation errors, and other issues.  The case was submitted to the court after closing [...]

  5. [...] and for other reasons throughout the trial, failure to disclose evidence by the prosecution, transcription and translation errors, and other issues.  The case was submitted to the court after closing [...]

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