EITI reports drop in demand for Arabic

Coincides with decrease in number of Iraqi asylum seekers

THE national interpreting and translation company EITI has reported a decrease in the number of requests for Arabic interpreters from public authorities and registered charities. The fall coincides with a sharp drop in the number of Iraqi nationals applying for asylum in the UK.

“We’re not able to say that there’s a link between these two things, but the timing is very coincidental,” says Carolyn Burgess, EITI’s Chief Executive.

According to UK asylum statistics published by the Home Office, Iraq was the top ‘application nationality’ for five consecutive quarters from Q1 2002 to Q1 2003 inclusive. During the same period, Arabic was the number one language in EITI’s ‘Top 10’, which ranks languages according to the number of requests for telephone or face to face interpreters received from UK public service providers.

Following the US-UK led invasion of Iraq in March 2003, the number of asylum applications by Iraqi nationals fell by 70% in Q2 2003 and remained at a similar level through to Q2 2004. Over the same period, Arabic dropped from number one in EITI’s Top 10 for January 2003 to number five in June 2004 (see illustration below).

“There are a number of things you have to take into account with all of this,” cautions Mrs Burgess.

“First of all, our Top 10 only includes requests for interpreters from organisations that use EITI. Having said that, our biggest users range from Newham Council in the East End of London to the Scottish Refugee Council in Glasgow, so our figures are a kind of national snapshot.

“Secondly, our Top 10 is based on requests from a wide range of public service providers, from NHS trusts to local councils to criminal justice organisations. Clearly, a large number of these requests will be unrelated to asylum seekers. On the other hand, we do regularly provide the Home Office with interpreters for asylum interviews.

“The third thing, of course, is that Arabic isn’t the only language spoken in Iraq. There are approximately 5 million Kurdish speakers in the north of the country, and Assyrian and Armenian are also spoken. Interestingly, Kurdish fell from fifth place in our Top 10 for the whole of 2003 to seventh place in our list for the first half of 2004.”

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Home Office immigration and asylum statistics