Pashto interpreting and translation

Pashto interpreting services for detailed testimony

A Kandahari speaker and someone from Peshawar understand each other, but accent and vocabulary differences can cause errors in a witness statement or a substantive asylum interview. We match the variety, including Wardak, Waziri and other central and tribal speech where needed. Many Afghan Pashtuns also speak Dari and many Pakistani Pashtuns speak Urdu; we ask which language the client prefers rather than assuming.

Face-to-face Pashto interpreting covers Home Office interviews, tribunals, police custody, probation meetings, courts, hospitals, mental health services and age assessments. When a duty solicitor needs Pashto at three in the morning, our telephone line answers, and video calls can be joined on the SILA Linguists® app or on Teams or Zoom. Gender-matched Pashto interpreters are often preferred, particularly for healthcare and interviews with women, and we arrange this at booking.

Pashto translation and certified translation

Pashto is written right to left with letters not found in Farsi or Arabic, such as ټ, ډ, ړ, ښ and ږ, and spelling differs slightly between Afghanistan and Pakistan. Afghan documents use the Solar Hijri calendar, or, in some recent documents, the lunar Hijri calendar, while Pakistani documents use Gregorian dates and are usually in Urdu or English, so we check the actual language of each document first.

We translate tazkiras, civil and court documents, school records, medical letters and witness statements, and each certified Pashto translation carries a signed declaration of accuracy, accepted by UK authorities such as Home Office caseworkers, judges and admissions teams, and by HR departments. Afghan and Pakistani papers for American files carry a certificate of accuracy, and Canadian authorities can receive a provincially certified translation. Into Pashto, we prepare health information, safeguarding guidance and resettlement material.

Pashto transcription and LADO

Police interviews, intercepted calls, voice notes and research interviews are set down word for word in Pashto, time-coded and rendered into English, with any Dari or Urdu passages labelled. If a decision maker doubts whether someone grew up in Nangarhar or in Peshawar, SILA Linguists® can arrange a LADO report on their Pashto.

Sectors we support in Pashto

Our vetted, trained and qualified Pashto linguists can support asylum and resettlement services, solicitors, police and probation, the NHS, mental health teams, children's services, schools and refugee charities. Our Pashto desk keeps track of every case, linguists are vetted and sign non-disclosure agreements, and personal information is processed under UK GDPR. Pashto interpreting is available to immigration courts and attorneys in the US, refugee proceedings in Canada, and hospitals and resettlement teams in both.