Language assitance as a procedural safeguard increasing the legal security in relation to migration

Abstract

The focus of the present paper lies on the attempt to map the current situation in the field of language/linguistic assistance provided to the third-country nationals detained in the detention facilities of the EU Member States. The author, particularly, stresses out the difficulties in ensuring the professional translation and interpreting services especially in cases of less-spread and indigenous languages that are in most cases mother tongues of the detained nationals. Thus, EU Member States face a formidable task as the obligation to ensure the procedural safeguards listed in the European Convention on Human Rights are guaranteed, and the fundamental rights are protected, and the language assistance is definitely one of them. Respect and protection of fundamental human rights contributes to the elementary sense of safety in all Meber States nationals living in the territory of the EU, even in the third-country nationals arriving into the EU. The present paper is the output of the project of the Academy of the Police Force in Bratislava: Intercultural Communication with the Third-Country Nationals in Detention Facilities (No. 241)