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http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/breaking/2009/0827/breaking5.htm
A man is due in court this morning in relation to the murder of a Catholic community worker who was battered to death by a loyalist mob in Co Derry in May.
The man (28) was charged last night and joins another six men who have already been charged with the murder of Kevin McDaid close to his home in the Heights area of Coleraine.
He is due to appear at Ballymena Magistrates Court in the morning, also charged with the attempted murder of Damien Fleming who was critically injured and left in a coma in the violence. Mr Fleming has since begun to recover.
Mr McDaid (49), a father of two, was attacked by loyalists who stormed a mainly nationalist estate after Rangers beat Celtic to the Scottish Premier League football title.
Residents of the area have since accused loyalists of trying to intimidate witnesses to the murder and the McDaid family home is among those that have been singled out for attack in recent weeks.
More than two dozen people have been arrested and questioned over the murder and violence that day and the six charged previously charged with murder face a series of other charges as do a further four men.
PA
http://u.tv/News/Youths-attacked-by-sectarian-mob/47909c47-9dee-4591-b20a-5ea767619e60
The manager of a Catholic football team has spoken out after his teenage players came under attack from a sectarian mob in east Belfast.
Thursday, 27 August 2009
The windows of their bus were stoned and they were verablly abused as they tried to leave the football grounds at Victoria Park.
The under-15 football team had been playing a friendly match against another team from Ardoyne on Wednesday night.
The east Belfast pitch was the only venue available, but the Short Strand team felt safe playing there because thay had used it before without incident.
As the match was being played a group of older teenagers began to gather at the sidelines.
When the two teams finished the game and tried to reach their buses, which were parked outside the grounds, the vehicles were attacked.
No one was hurt in the incident, but the bus was badly damaged.
Police have confirmed that they are investigating the incident and they say a sectarian motive is one line of inquiry.
The youth club organisers say it will cost £1000 to fix the damage.
© UTV News
http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/breaking/2009/0827/breaking69.htm
Thu, Aug 27, 2009
A damning internal report on the state of policing in the North should spark a rethink on the devolution of justice powers to the Assembly, Ulster Unionists claimed today.
This came as it was confirmed that the new Chief Constable of the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI), Matt Baggott, will take over on September 22nd.
But while the Policing Board said it looked forward to his arrival, there were calls today for the full publication of the PSNI strategic review after leaks showed the document had catalogued major problems.
The internal report which was prepared by senior officers and marked ‘restricted’, suggested the police service was being choked by paper work, with the focus on recording crime rather than fighting it.
It said the PSNI had lost 704 frontline officers in the past three years, that 61per cent of officers’ time is spent inside stations rather than on the beat and that little time was spent tackling issues such as anti-social behaviour.
The report also raised concerns over a lack of clarity on future relationships between the police and a new Ministry of Justice at Stormont.
The Ulster Unionist Party’s Tom Elliot said it had sparked questions over the devolution of policing and justice powers.
“The UUP position is that devolution of Policing and Justice may be possible in the future if the circumstances are right. We have, however, expressed our concerns that the arrangements between the DUP and Sinn Féin would result in a puppet minister subject to joint control, permanent veto and answerable only to the OFMDFM,” he said.
“The PSNI’s Strategic Review demonstrates that there are enormous problems at the very core of our policing service, problems that will require clear thought, a collective approach and steely determination to resolve.
“Any new Justice Minister will need to have the personal, political and public authority to turn the PSNI into the service it should be and could be.” He added: “So, instead of rushing headlong into the creation of such a ministry, all of the political parties in the Assembly will have to engage in a very serious and very detailed debate.”
The police said the report had also highlighted their success in implementing the Patten reforms that helped overhaul the force.
Officers argued the document also signalled the determination of senior officers to correct problems faced by the service.
The Committee on the Administration of Justice (CAJ) human rights group called for the internal PSNI document to be published.
CAJ Policing Programme Officer Mick Beyers said: “We recognise that the PSNI is an organisation in transition and CAJ will not prejudge the findings of the Strategic Review until we have read the report.
“However, it is critical that CAJ and other key stakeholder organisations, as well as the wider community, have access to such documents which not only have radical implications for the structure and management of the police, but also for human rights, accountability, equality and community safety.”
PA
© 2009 irishtimes.com
http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/opinion/2009/0828/1224253398925.html
Fri, Aug 28, 2009
A NOTE of frustration infused the comments of departing PSNI chief constable Hugh Orde this week when he called on political and community leaders to engage fully in the creation of a more integrated society in Northern Ireland. Intolerance, he said, was embedded in Northern society and there was an over-reliance on the police service to fix it. Racism, paramilitarism and unresolved issues from the Troubles should be addressed and resolved on a much broader, community basis, he told our northern news editor Dan Keenan.
Seven years as head of the PSNI has given Sir Hugh a unique position from which to consider the successes and disappointments of the peace process. A power-sharing Executive is in place. The Provisional IRA has disarmed and loyalist paramilitary organisations are following suit. Representatives from Sinn Féin participate on policing boards. And there is broad community support for the PSNI. But policing and justice powers have yet to be devolved to Stormont. And while that exercise will not resolve the problems alluded to by the chief constable, it will offer politicians and administrators an opportunity to build greater community trust through the integration of law enforcement and other public services.
An internal PSNI document, drawn up by senior officers, anticipates that terrorism will remain a threat for some years. Equally worrying is a suggestion that less than half of all crimes are being reported to police because the public believe they cannot achieve anything. Concern is also expressed that too much police time is being spent on paperwork, when officers should be out in the community investigating crime. Visible policing, particularly on foot, has always been the most effective way of promoting law and order. In spite of such concerns, significant progress has been made. The PSNI now attracts broad community support. It is increasingly reflective of the community it serves. And the level of crime has fallen.
Understandable unease exists in some quarters concerning the transfer of policing and justice powers from Westminster. And the PSNI is not immune. Senior officers worry about how a tripartite relationship between the PSNI, the Northern Ireland Policing Board and the department of justice will operate in practice and how it will affect their work. Change is always difficult. But acceptance of responsibility for domestic affairs, particularly in matters of law and order, represents a vital step towards normality and a sharing of values in Northern Ireland.
A dangerous stage has been reached. Peace and normality, although not finally secured, are being taken for granted. Dissident republicans have become more active in their attempts to re-ignite sectarian conflict. In loyalist communities, racial hatred has led to attacks on foreign nationals.
The PSNI has a duty to protect all vulnerable groups. But local politicians and civic leaders hold prime position. To protect gains already made, they must become more active in promoting a culture of tolerance and an acceptance of diversity.
© 2009 The Irish Times
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/northern_ireland/foyle_and_west/8224607.stm
About 50 people have taken part in a memorial service for 18 soldiers killed in an IRA double bomb ambush in Warrenpoint 30 years ago.
It happened on the same day as the Mullaghmore bomb, which killed Lord Louis Mountbatten and three others.
In the Sligo village a church bell tolled 30 times to mark the anniversary on Thursday.
A row has broken out in Donegal over council plans to erect a memorial to the Mullaghmore victims.
Sinn Féin said they oppose the monument because it would be wrong to single out any one incident.
But the Fianna Fáil mayor of Donegal, Brendan Byrne, says it should go ahead.
"As mayor of Donegal I'm not erecting a memorial to a member of the British Royal family.
"I'm erecting a monument to the four people who perished needlessly, senselessly, at Mullaghmore some 30 years ago."
Sinn Féin councillor Padraig MacLochlainn said a memorial would be "inappropriate".
"We cannot cherry pick any particular incident for memorial.
"What would be more appropriate would be that we commemorate the over 3,000 people that lost their lives on all sides," he said.
Four people, including two children, died when the IRA detonated a bomb on Lord Mountbatten's boat off the coast of Sligo 30 years ago.
Eighteen British soldiers were killed later that day when two booby-trap bombs exploded beside Narrow Water Castle near Warrenpoint in County Down.
The bombs were detonated from a short distance across Carlingford Lough in the Republic of Ireland and when troops returned fire a civilian died in the crossfire.
He was Londoner Michael Hudson, who was out bird watching, and had been one of the Queen's Royal coachmen at Buckingham Palace.
Among those taking part in the Warrenpoint memorial were former soldiers and relatives of those who died.
The DUP assembly member Jeffry Donaldson and the UUP's Danny Kennedy also attended.
Hymns were sung and a two-minute silence was held, before wreaths were laid at the scene at Narrowwater. The names of the 18 soldiers who died were also read out.
Story from BBC NEWS
Published: 2009/08/27 18:00:19 GMT
© BBC MMIX
http://u.tv/News/Ted-Kennedy-Irelands-friend/daf9cf52-90aa-4ec5-ad74-fda1e3ac3074
Gerry Adams: A strong and genuine advocate for citizens' rights, Ted Kennedy played a pivotal role in the Northern Ireland peace process
Thursday, 27 August 2009
I first met Senator Teddy Kennedy early in October 1994 in Boston. The IRA cessation was over a month old. I was in the US for a fortnight-long coast-to-coast visit – a frenetic city-a-day whirlwind tour.
We started in Boston and Teddy was there to greet us at the airport. From our first meeting I was very taken by him. He had played a very crucial role in the build up to the cessation, in particular by supporting a visa for me. Then as the painstaking work of constructing a peace process continued in Ireland and as it created the possibility and opportunity of an IRA cessation, he also intervened to support an immediate visa for the late Joe Cahill.
Teddy's sister Jean Kennedy Smith, US ambassador to Ireland, played a pivotal role in the last minute tick-tacking between Sinn Féin through Fr Alex Reid, the taoiseach Albert Reynolds and her brother the senator.
The Cahill visa issue went down to the wire. Sinn Féin had our own contacts with the White House and I had made the case that a visa for Joe Cahill would be proof that the US supported an alternative way for republicans to pursue our objectives.
The taoiseach was also lobbying the White House. But as is now a matter of public record President Clinton was being offered conflicting advice by his own system. It is my view that Senator Kennedy's direct appeal was crucial. So also was the encouraging role of his sister Jean. Cahill's visit to the US, even as news of the IRA cessation was being announced, showed the Irish republican base in the States as well as in Ireland that there was another way forward.
Teddy's role in getting the Cahill visa was always a source of much humour for the senator. Apparently the State Department came back with Joe's record. Aside from numerous terms of imprisonment and a deportation from the US he was also sentenced to death in the 1940s for the killing of an RUC officer. He and others escaped the hangman's noose but one of their group, Joe's friend Tom Williams, was hanged in Belfast prison.
"I never said he was an altar boy," the senator recalled telling the US authorities.
He himself was firmly against political violence. He was a long standing supporter of John Hume. The Irish government's role in the US in the 70s, 80s and early 90s was very divisive and badly advised, more concerned with anti-IRA propaganda than genuine work for peace or national reconciliation in Ireland. Or for the rights of Irish citizens, particularly in the north of Ireland or Britain.
For his part Senator Kennedy never allowed this to prevent him from being an advocate for citizens' rights. And when called on to stand up for a real peace process Teddy Kennedy stood up.
Later, at other critical phases in the process – particularly when the IRA cessation broke down almost two years later in 1996, on the back of John Major's government and the unionists refusing to talk to republicans – the senator stayed steady. In 1997 he made a keynote speech calling on the British government to set a date for Sinn Féin's entry into talks. For this he was roundly abused by London.
In the end, of course, he was vindicated.
Teddy was a good American. His work in the US senate is the stuff of legend. He was a genuine and powerful voice for disadvantaged people in his own country for almost five decades. The American people who have lost a champion.
guardian.co.uk © Guardian News and Media 2009
http://www.newsletter.co.uk/news/Kennedy-was-the-very-worst.5593403.jp
Published Date: 27 August 2009
By ALEX KANE
THE Kennedy brothers were as close as America ever got to having its own royal family: the glamour, the political power base, the "look", the tragedies, the Camelot era of promise and change that was the 1960s.
Indeed, to some extent the Kennedys defined both the initial hope and the inevitable failure that was the 1960s: opening with the swearing in of John Kennedy as President in January 1961; his assassination in 1963; Robert's own Presidential bid ending with his assassination in June 1968; and then Edward's White House hopes dashed at Chappaquiddick in July 1969.
History, so far, has been kinder to both John and Robert than they deserved. It was President Johnson who was actually the real driving force behind the epoch-defining civil rights legislation of the mid-1960s; while Richard Nixon was responsible for beginning the thaw in relationships with both Russia and China.
What will history make of Edward, particularly his views on Ireland? Well, he was very much opposed to the existence of Northern Ireland within the United Kingdom and endorsed, on many occasions, the Troops Out Movement. He was a hugely influential voice in Irish-American circles for decades and often spoke of "British violence and oppression in that part of Ireland they still occupy". It's hard not to believe that he was unaware that money raised at Irish-American events he spoke at was finding its way into Sinn Fein coffers and possibly to the IRA itself. And he was instrumental in securing a visa for Gerry Adams to travel to the United States.
Yet after a lifetime of promoting Irish unity and British withdrawal he ended up supporting the Belfast Agreement; an agreement that recognized the legitimacy of Northern Ireland, the constitutional rights of unionists, the ending of the Republic's constitutional claim and the requirement that the IRA decommission and stand down.
Yes, he played a part in the peace process, but he only played that part because he had made himself such a key player in the Irish-American support network that had politically and financially bankrolled an armed and ruthless terrorist organization in part of the United Kingdom.
For me, his very belated conversion to democratic reality doesn't counterbalance the decades of private and public support for organisations that both practiced and justified terrorism in another country. He represented the very worst type of political interference: the outsider perched on a self-made moral high-ground who didn't have to face the brutal consequences of his trans-Atlantic cheer-leading.
Some say that he redeemed and rehabilitated himself after the Chappaquiddick incident. Maybe so, in American eyes. But as a unionist in Northern Ireland I have a less charitable view of Senator Edward Kennedy.
http://www.irishcentral.com/news/col/oclery/How-Edward-Kennedy-saved-the-Irish-peace-process-55121852.html
By Conor O'Clery
Published Wednesday, August 26, 2009, 5:13 PM
I first came to know Senator Kennedy well during the “visa wars” of 1994 when the Clinton White House defied the wrath of the British to grant a US visa to Gerry Adams.
To watch the Massachusetts Senator op erate then was to witness a classic exercise in the use of power.
And what he did helped change Irish history and save lives. How he got to that point involved an odyssey through the maze and contradictions of Irish and Irish-American politics.
Kennedy, always a champion of civil rights, was first attracted to the cause of the nationalists in Northern Ireland a quarter of a century earlier, when they were not just the underdog fighting for civil rights but a struggling people cut from the same cloth as his ancestors who emigrated to America during the potato famine.
By sending a telegram of support to the Civil Rights Association that year he became the first Kennedy to get directly involved in the Irish question.
His father Joe Kennedy had been US ambassador to Ireland in 1938-1940 but there is no evidence that he concerned himself with “John Bull’s political slum” as the Sunday Times once famously described Northern Ireland.
His brother John F Kennedy did accept an invitation to visit Ireland as president in 1963 but turned down a request from Minister for Foreign Affairs Frank Aiken to persuade the British to drop their opposition to a United Ireland. The Irish ambassador to Washington Dr. J.T. Kiernan reported at the time that President Kennedy was, by his education, “British inclined.”
If Edward Kennedy was similarly inclined he soon changed as the civil rights movement was swept aside and the violence in Northern Ireland worsened. According to his biographer Adam Clymer he was prompted to take a more proactive role by an unidentified woman who met him in a park in London and demanded to know how he could speak out against the Kent State shooting of anti-Vietnam War students and not against what British troops were doing in Northern Ireland.
Kennedy made his first Senate speech on Northern Ireland on 20th October 1971. His accusation that “Ulster is becoming Britain’s Vietnam” and his later charge, after Bloody Sunday, 30 January 1972, when British soldiers killed 13 Derry civilians, that it was an action comparable to the slaughter of Vietnamese civilians at My Lai, infuriated the British. To the end of his days the Fleet Street tabloid press would consistently and wrongly characterize Kennedy as a fellow traveler of the IRA.
In London at the time I recall asking Lord Hailsham, the then Lord Chancellor, what effect interventions by Irish Americans like Senator Kennedy had on British policy on Ireland. He reported angrily, banging his hand on the table, “Those Roman Catholic bastards, how dare they interfere!”
The British were always concerned about the “interference’ of ethnic groups in the United States, especially Irish or German, on the so-called historic ‘special relationship’ between London and Washington. Kennedy, whose two brothers were killed by assassins’ bullets, was prepared to interfere, but he had no brief for violence and he grew uneasy when his calls for “Brits out” associated him with militant Irish American groups in the United States which gave support to the IRA.
A turning point came when, on a trip to a NATO meeting in Germany, he telephoned John Hume in Derry to ask for a meeting. The SDLP leader had made an impression in Washington with his criticisms of pro-IRA sentiment among Irish Americans and his calls for constitutional reform.
“I need to know what’s really going on in Northern Ireland and I am told you are the perso n I should talk to,” said Kennedy on the phone. Hume, who initially thought it was a hoax call, borrowed the fare from the Derry Credit Union to travel to Bonn where they met over dinner with the Irish ambassador on 21st November 1972.
Hume impressed Kennedy with his advocacy of constitutional change on the basis of consent, and from then on the Massachusetts Senator aligned himself with the SDLP leader on Irish issues and undertook to help promote peaceful change.
Shortly afterwards Kennedy, Tip O’Neill, then Speaker of the House, Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan of New York State, and Governor Hugh Carey of New York banded together to appeal to Americans every St Patrick’s Day to renounce any action that promoted violence. The “Four Horsemen” as they were known also called for an Irish dimension to peace efforts and investment in the border economy.
Kennedy successfully lobbied the Carter administration to pledge financial assistance to Northern Ireland in the event of a settlement. Reflecting his close association with Hume, he refused to support the McBride Principles which were popular with many Irish Americans as a way of forcing equal employment20in Northern Ireland, but dismissed by Hume as a disincentive to US investment.
Kennedy also intervened to get Carter to suspend US weapon sales to the RUC, which further infuriated London. Kennedy because a counterweight to the influence in the US of Irish Northern Aid (Noraid) and the Irish National Caucus and as such a powerful ally of the Irish Government.
The split in the Irish American community at that time caused a minor transatlantic crisis when Charles Haughey, on becoming Taoiseach in 1979, sought to move Irish ambassador to Washington Sean Donlon who had become embroiled in a struggle for influence among Irish Americans with the more militant members of Congressman Mario Biaggi’s Ad Hoc Committee for Irish Affairs. Kennedy, Moynihan and O’Neill let Haughey know in transatlantic calls just how much they valued Donlon and what he stood for, and the embarrassed Taoiseach had to let the matter drop.
Kennedy subsequently helped persuade Republican President Ronald Reagan to lean on Margaret Thatcher to sign up to the 1985 Anglo-Irish Agreement. By the time Bill Clinton was elected Democratic President in 1992, Kennedy had become the most powerful figure in a Democratic Senate. Clinton knew he would have to rely heavily on the Massachusetts Senator for his legislative agenda, and it followed that he would be reluctant to deviate from the Kennedy line on any issue, including Ireland.
Kennedy was thus able to persuade Clinton to appoint his sister Jean Kennedy Smith as ambassador to Dublin, at a time when Speaker Tom Foley was lobbying hard for Massachusetts politician Brian Donnelly to be given the job. A few months later the issue of a visa for Gerry Adams erupted in Washington.
Clinton had made a qualified promise during his campaign to grant a US visa to Adams, who had been barred by previous administrations from entering the United States because of Sinn Fein’s association with the IRA. The granting of a visa was at first opposed by John Hume, the Irish Government and Ted Kennedy.
However when an group of influential Irish American businessmen and union leaders put together by New York publisher Niall O’Dowd sought a visa in December 1993 to allow the Sinn Fein leader to promote the peace process at a conference in New York on 1st February 1994, things changed.
It was clear to everyone that Kennedy would be crucial to a favorable White House decision. The senator traveled to Dublin to spend New Year with his sister and take soundings.
On the first night she hosted a dinner for him with Tim Pat Coogan, an authority through his books on the IRA who advised him that a visa would go a long way to persuade the hard men that there would be political gains from ending their campaign.
Next day she took him to see the Taoiseach Albert Reynolds who told him, “I think you should go for it because I think he (Adams) wants peace.” Kennedy was taken aback at the change of Irish government policy and did not give any commitm ent.
Shortly afterwards however, at the funeral of Tip O’Neill in Boston, he encountered John Hume who also said it would advance the cause of peace. Kennedy was now convinced. On 15 January, just after Jean Kennedy Smith sent a recommendation to the White House to grant the visa, Kennedy sent a letter to the President signed by himself, John Kerry, Chris Dodd and Daniel Patrick Moynihan, supporting the application on the grounds that it would strengthen Adams’ hand with the militants.
Kennedy recruited several other senior Congress members to sign the letter, including Senate majority leader George Mitchell. He called the President to warn that a refusal would produce a ground swell of ill will from Irish Americans. Kennedy’s intervention provided crucial political cover for Clinton, who was inclined to ta ke the risk of letting a spokesman for a banned organisation into the US, but was facing fierce opposition from Tom Foley, the State Department and the FBI.
The British were furious when he authorised the visa, and Kennedy and Clinton were excoriated in Fleet Street tabloids. One British newspaper headline said the decision caused the “worse crisis since Suez” in transatlantic relations. “See what the Brits are saying about me?” said Clinton when Kennedy called to thank him. The senator replied, “Don’t worry about it, That’s what the Brits have been saying about the Kennedys for years.” The granting of the visa did work however. It did advance the cause of peace.
The IRA declared a ceasefire in August 1994 and the loyalist paramilitary groups shortly followed suit. The ceasefires were the culmination of years of contacts, many secret, involving London, Dublin and Belfast but Gerry Adams told me many years later that he believed the intervention of Irish America, and especially Senator Kennedy, had brought the ceasefire forward by about a year.
The number of people alive today who might otherwise have been killed can never be known but could run to several score. With the passing of time the decision on the visa came to be seen even by the British as tactically correct. Jonathan Powell, who as a Washington-based British diplomat lobbied vigorously against the visa and who up to the last minute thought the British would prevail, wrote in his 2008 book ‘Great Hatred, Little Room’ that in retrospect “Clinton was clearly right in the decision he made.”
The sum of Kennedy’s contribution to Ireland over four decades is much greater than this one dramatic episode. But it was a defining moment in de cision-making at the White House, when the confluence of a powerful senator, a president prepared to take risks, a canny Irish prime minister, and a Northern Ireland politician prepared to cede the stage to a rival, provided a breakthrough in the quest for peace in a small country.
It is a mark of the revisionist appreciation in Britain Government circles of Kennedy and his “daring to interfere” that in March this year he was given an honorary knighthood by Queen Elizabeth for services to the British-American relationship and to Northern Ireland." Lord Hailsham must be turning in his grave.
http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/breaking/2009/0827/breaking65.htm
ANNE LUCEY
Thu, Aug 27, 2009
The funeral took place today of Kerry man John O’Sullivan, who was shot dead near his farm in a rural part of northern California earlier this month.
The eldest of eight children of a well-established south Kerry island family, Mr O’Sullivan (47)had emigrated to the US in the 1980s to seek work.
His body was brought home to Valentia Island where he was waked last night.
At overflowing requiem mass at the Church of the Immaculate Conception in Knightstown, Valentia, celebrant and local parish priest Fr John Shanahan said Mr O’Sullivan had died tragically.
The priest described guns and knives as “the instruments of death and destruction” for so many people.
“John died in the month of August. For us August is the month when our day starts to shorten, we don’t like to see it come. It’s as true for the family today. Today is the darkest day in this month of August in this year for them but a brighter day and a better day will come, ” the priest said.
Mr O’Sullivan was buried in Kilmore Cemetery on the island. He is survived by five children, including two step children and an adopted son and his wife Krista.
Mr O’Sullivan emigrated to the US in the 1980s, first working in New York before buying a farm and vineyard in Amador County in the Sierra Nevada foothills, about 70km from Sacramento. He was also involved in property.
His neighbour Kenneth John Zimmerman (56) has been arrested on suspicion of his murder. It is understood the two men were involved in a long standing dispute.
© 2009 irishtimes.com
http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/breaking/2009/0827/breaking45.htm
ELAINE EDWARDS
Thu, Aug 27, 2009
Irish speakers will from today have a useful online tool to translate web pages into their first language, with the expansion of Google’s Translate service to include Gaeilge.
Google has launched a full suite of translation tools in Irish.
The service can be used to translate specific web pages or text, as well as to search English web pages using Irish keywords. The results can be translated from any of 51other languages into Irish.
Google cites the example of an Irish-speaking internet user planning an African safari.
Web results about safari tour companies in English, French or another language can be translated into Irish in “a fraction of a second” using the Google tool.
Users can also paste text or a URL for a particular webpage in any of the 51 supported languages and receive a translation in Irish immediately via Google Translate.
Director of product management at Google Tom Stocky said the company believed the Internet was about “enabling access to the world’s information - all of the world’s information - in all of its languages”.
“Today’s launch of Google Translate in nine new languages makes it easier to access web content from all over the web, even when it is written in a language that is not your own.”
Google said machine translation was “not perfect” but it was “a great tool for anyone looking to access and get an overview of information in languages he or she doesn’t know well”.
The search engine also allows users suggest a better translation if they encounter a translation that’s “awkward or not quite right”.
Google said it uses this feedback to help improve translation quality in future updates to the system.
Other languages available for translation using the service include Afrikaans, Albanian, Arabic, Belarusian, Bulgarian, Catalan, Chinese, Croatian, Czech, Danish, Dutch, English, Estonian, Filipino, Finnish, French, Galician, German, Greek, Hebrew, Hindi, Hungarian, Icelandic, Indonesian, Irish, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Latvian, Lithuanian, Macedonian, Malay, Maltese, Norwegian, Persian, Polish, Portuguese, Romanian, Russian, Serbian, Slovak, Slovenian, Spanish, Swahili, Swedish, Thai, Turkish, Ukrainian, Vietnamese, Welsh and Yiddish.
© 2009 irishtimes.com
Updated: 11/5/2009
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