Der Spiegel proudly stands by its work. (And rightly so—events have borne them out.) Their tape contains both Maliki’s original Arabic and the translator’s real-time English. When the magazine readied the transcript, Zand verified the translation against Maliki’s Arabic. On this sensitive interview, and the Obama portion of the interview, Müller von Blumencron emphasizes they stayed “very close. Very, very close.”
So how did the Times get its listen? Simple—it asked. According to Müller von Blumencron, Times reporter Sabrina Tavernise and her translator met with Zand in Baghdad, where he played them the relevant quote.
There’s something else that journalists calling Der Spiegel would have learned. “We have a policy at Der Spiegel when we do a question and answer session to provide a transcript to our counterparts in case they want to have a minor thing changed,” says Müller von Blumencron, who says Zand verified that Maliki’s aides received the publication-ready advance copy. They had no response, and presumably no complaints, before its release.
Der Spiegel has no plans to release the tape (“We don’t see a need to improve upon our credibility by, say, putting the audio on the web.”) but is happy to play it—in person, over the phone—for any journalist interested in verifying.
“Anyone who wants to hear it can hear it,” says Müller von Blumencron. “But no one else has asked.”
May I add that this is a general policy in Germany - they do much more Q&As and because usually these can´t be printed without being slightly edited, it is a standard procedure to have it authorized by the interview partner. This is pretty uncommon in the U.S., but everybody does it in Germany - of course you will always fight with your interview partner in case he wants to soften his stances and usually you will reach at least a compromise.
Posted by elmateo on Wed 23 Jul 2008 at 02:00 AM
Clint Hendler misses a crucial point: Der Speigel issued two versions of the same al-Maliki interview.
The original exchange published went as follows:
SPIEGEL: Would you hazard a prediction as to when most of the US troops will finally leave Iraq?
Maliki: As soon as possible, as far as we’re concerned. US presidential candidate Barack Obama is right when he talks about 16 months. Assuming that positive developments continue, this is about the same time period that corresponds to our wishes.
Subsequently Der Spiegel altered the exchange to read as thus:
SPIEGEL: Would you hazard a prediction as to when most of the US troops will finally leave Iraq?
Maliki: As soon as possible, as far as we’re concerned. U.S. presidential candidate Barack Obama talks about 16 months. That, we think, would be the right timeframe for a withdrawal, with the possibility of slight changes.
The qualifier "assuming that positive developments continue" was mysteriously deleted from the translation from no explanation. But the qualifier is key. With the qualifier, the 16 month timetable becomes conditions based. One has to ask: when al-Maliki was shown the translation of his remarks, a translation which he was said to have approved, which version was he shown?
Posted by DubiousD on Wed 23 Jul 2008 at 01:42 PM
Well, DubiousD, you´re missing a point: Der Spiegel is a German publication. They are being printed in German. And what they have on their English website are translations from the German only. So the only quote that matters is the one they printed in German and that one has always been the same! If they changed the quote on their English website, as you say, the only explanations is that the first translation from the German may have been inaccurate. But stop acting as if Spiegel was a magazine in English, it´s not, and the quote has always been the same in German, and it´s just identical to the one that´s on their English website now and it´s what the NYT has confirmed to be true. So I really don´t see your problem.
Posted by Pete C. on Wed 23 Jul 2008 at 06:58 PM
Pete C. wrote:
"So the only quote that matters is the one they printed in German and that one has always been the same!"
Pete, read Clint's piece right above you. He clearly states:
"During the interview, Der Spiegel spoke in English, and after listening to each question repeated in Arabic, and hearing Maliki’s responses in Arabic, finally heard its answer in English via Maliki’s translator."
Therefore the original transcript of Maliki's interview was in English, not German. Therefore the English transcript is the one that matters.
Additionally, if Der Spiegel is so confident that they transcribed Maliki's interview accurately, let them post audio from the interview on their web site so that we may be the judge.
Posted by DubiousD on Thu 24 Jul 2008 at 02:33 AM