ĐỀ THI CUỐI KỲ MÔN PHIÊN DỊCH 2 TIẾNG ANH THƯƠNG MẠI

Đề thi môn phiên dịch 2 khoa tiếng anh thương mại cho các bạn tham khảo. Every year, the Committee to Protect Journalists releases a report on the conditions faced by reporters around the world. The report tells about killings and suspicious disappearances of news writers, photographers, radio and television broadcasters and publishers. The report also discusses actions by governments and other groups to repress the news media. TwoThousandOne was a dangerous year for reporters around the world. At least thirtyseven were killed because of what they reported or because they were working in dangerous situations. That is thirteen more deaths than the year before. The report says conditions last year were very bad for reporters in Burma, Syria and Columbia. Three reporters were killed in Colombia. And the Committee to Protect Journalists says it still is investigating the suspicious deaths of five other reporters in Colombia. The Executive Director of the Committee to Protect Journalists is Ann Cooper. She says reporting about wars is dangerous. Eight reporters died last year covering the war in Afghanistan. But, she says reporters generally face the greatest risk when reporting about government wrong doing in their own countries. She says members of the press may be murdered because of the information they report. That happened last year, she says, in Bangladesh, China, Yugoslavia and Thailand.

Committee to Protect Journalists

2001 Report

By Caty Weaver

Every year, the Committee to Protect Journalists releases a report

on the conditions faced by reporters around the world

The report tells about killings and suspicious disappearances of news writers,photographers, radio and television broadcasters and publishers The report alsodiscusses actions by governments and other groups to repress the news media

Two-Thousand-One was a dangerous year for reporters around the world At leastthirty-seven were killed because of what they reported or because they wereworking in dangerous situations That is thirteen more deaths than the year before The report says conditions last year were very bad for reporters in Burma, Syriaand Columbia Three reporters were killed in Colombia And the Committee toProtect Journalists says it still is investigating the suspicious deaths of five otherreporters in Colombia

The Executive Director of the Committee to Protect Journalists is Ann Cooper.She says reporting about wars is dangerous Eight reporters died last year coveringthe war in Afghanistan But, she says reporters generally face the greatest riskwhen reporting about government wrongdoing in their own countries She saysmembers of the press may be murdered because of the information they report.That happened last year, she says, in Bangladesh, China, Yugoslavia and Thailand.The report by the Committee to Protect Journalists also suggests increased effortslast year to repress the media around the world For example, the Committee saysthere was a major rise in the number of reporters put in jail for doing their work

The report says one-hundred-eighteen reporters were jailed last year compared toeighty-one in Two-Thousand China jailed thirty-five reporters, more than anyother country for the third year

The report also discusses the way the terrorist attacks on the United States affectedreporting last year It says some governments acted to interfere with or blockreporting about the attacks Other governments used national security concerns as

an excuse to restrict the press after the attacks The report notes the American StateDepartment’s unsuccessful attempt to stop the V-O-A from broadcasting part of aninterview with Taleban leader Mullah Omar

The report always includes a list of those people it considers the ten worst enemies

of the press Iranian leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei again is at the top of the list

He is followed by Charles Taylor, the president of Liberia, and Chinese PresidentJiang Zemin

The Committee to Protect Journalists is based in New York It was established inNineteen-Eighty-One to support freedom of the press internationally It works todefend the right of reporters to do their work without fear of punishment

AIDS Conference

By Cynthia Kirk

A new report says that the disease AIDS will cause a sharp drop inlife expectancy in fifty-one countries by the year Two-Thousand-Ten A study by the United States Census Bureau was releasedduring the International AIDS Conference this week in Barcelona,Spain Experts say several nations are losing one-hundred years of progress inextending the length of life of their citizens

AIDS has killed more than twenty-million people around the world Experts sayabout forty-million people are infected with H-I-V, the virus that causes AIDS.More than six-million people are infected in Asian countries Most of them live inIndia, China and Indonesia AIDS is also spreading quickly in Russia, LatinAmerica and the Caribbean But Africa has been hardest hit by the disease Almostthirty-million people are infected with the virus

Seven countries in southern Africa now have life expectancies of less than fortyyears For example, in Botswana, life expectancy is thirty-nine years By Two-Thousand-Ten, it could be less than twenty-seven years Mozambique is expected

to have a similar reduction in life expectancy Lives would also be shortened inother southern African countries Without AIDS, officials say the average lifeexpectancy in southern Africa by Two-Thousand-Ten would have been aboutseventy years

There are also many more babies dying from AIDS in southern Africa.Researchers say that in Botswana, Zimbabwe, South Africa and Namibia, morebabies will die from AIDS by Two-Thousand-Ten than from all other causes

American Census Bureau official Karen Stanecki says there soon will be moredeaths than births in southern African countries because of AIDS She says asadults die, millions of children will grow up without parents

A United Nations report says about thirteen-million children have already lost one

or both parents to AIDS in eighty-eight countries Most of these orphans live insouthern African countries The report estimates that there will be at least twenty-five million AIDS orphans by Two-Thousand-Ten

Some non-governmental organizations say that number is far too low They saythere will be almost one-hundred-million orphans by Two-Thousand-Ten

Carol Bellamy is the director of the United Nations Children’s Fund She saysAIDS orphans face many problems, even if they are not infected They are oftenmistreated by the communities, forced out of school, and sometimes becometargets for illegal activities She says girls are the group most at risk

AIDS officials say ten-thousand-million dollars is needed each year for research,treatment and care for people with AIDS Yet, they say wealthy nations haveagreed to pay less than one-third of that amount

The report also says that women are affected most by poor health care systems,especially pregnant women It says that better reproductive health can reducepoverty and build economic growth The report says family planning and helpingwomen avoid unwanted pregnancies are also ways to reduce poverty

The study says that when given a choice, poor people in developing countries havefewer children than their parents did Smaller families have fewer expenses andmore chances to increase their earnings and savings

Since nineteen-seventy, developing countries with lower birth rates and slowerpopulation growth have had faster economic growth They have had higherproductivity, more savings and more investment

The report also notes that poor people are more at risk for the infection that causesAIDS This is because they lack the knowledge and power to protect themselvesagainst the disease

The report says that investing in education, especially for women, can also reducepoverty Educated women have more choices in life and are more likely to send

their children to school The study found that the right to an education hasimproved over the past ten years However, poor people in many developingcountries are still less likely to attend school The report urges governments tochange this and make sure all citizens learn to read and write

The U-N study also says that women and men should be treated equally Thismeans that legal and human rights for women should be strengthened, as well astheir ability to earn money and speak out socially and politically

The U-N report says that half the world’s population live on less than two dollars aday One-thousand-million people live on less than one dollar a day

Air Pollution/Lung Cancer

By Cynthia Kirk

Researchers have completed a major study on the health effects of air pollutioncommon in many large American cities The study shows that air pollutionincreases the risk of death from lung cancer and other diseases They say peopleliving in heavily polluted areas have a sixteen percent higher risk of dying of lungcancer than people in less polluted areas They say the risk is similar to that ofsomeone living with a person who smokes cigarettes

The latest study involved five-hundred-thousand people inmore than one-hundred American cities The researchersexamined their health records from Nineteen-Eighty-Twothrough Nineteen-Ninety-Eight They also gatheredinformation about air pollution in the cities where thepeople lived

Researchers say the higher lung cancer risk is linked to pollution caused by smallparticles of soot from coal-burning power centers, factories and motor vehicles

Power centers built before Nineteen-Eighty produce about half the nation’selectricity However, they also produce most of the power industry’s dangerouspollutants These include sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxide and soot.Air pollutionlevels have decreased during the past twenty years because of better enforcement

of clean air laws Yet levels of small particle pollution in major cities are at orabove pollution limits set by the Environmental Protection Agency

The E-P-A set new pollution limits in Nineteen-Ninety-Seven after studies showed

a link between small particle pollution and lung cancer However, powercompanies have taken legal action against the agency to delay the

restrictions.Environmental groups have long suggested that pollution from powercenters has led to a sharp increase in deaths from lung diseases They have urgedaction to either close the factories or force them to put in anti-pollution equipment.The American Lung Association says the latest findings show the urgent need toclean up aging power factories

Experts who have spent years examining the links between pollution andsicknesses generally support the latest study The Environmental ProtectionAgency says it will consider the research as part of its continuing study of airquality rules on small particle pollution

APEC Meeting and North Korea

APEC foreign and trade ministers started talks earlier this week On Thursday, theforeign ministers approved a joint statement that promised to suppress thefinancing of terrorism The statement also promised to strengthen security for airtravel and shipping of goods

President Bush and leaders of other APEC countries are meeting this weekend.Reports say Mister Bush will be trying to gain support for his campaigns againstterrorism and its supporters and against Iraq APEC leaders also are expected todiscuss the latest situation involving North Korea

Earlier this month, the United States announced that North Korea had admitted it

is secretly developing nuclear weapons The admission reportedly came duringtalks between a high level North Korean official and an American special

diplomat The diplomat reportedly had presented the official with Americanintelligence evidence about the suspected weapons program

A North Korean nuclear weapons program would violate an agreement betweenthe two countries In nineteen-ninety-four, North Korea agreed to halt its suspectedweapons program In exchange, the United States said it would provide NorthKorea with nuclear power reactors and supplies of heating fuel

North Korea says it does not believe the United States has honored the agreement.Experts say North Korea considered the agreement a promise by the United States

to end hostile relations and establish normal relations And, experts say that therelationship between the two countries has worsened in the last two years

North Korea says it wants new talks with the United States about the agreement

On Tuesday, North Korean officials threatened to take strong action if the UnitedStates would not agree to negotiations However, North Korea did not say whatform such action would take

The Bush administration has suggested that the issue can be settled through

diplomatic action But, administration officials have not answered the call for talks They say the United States will decide what steps to take after APEC leadersdiscuss the issue

Global Summit of Women

By Cynthia Kirk

About six-hundred business, professional and governmentalleaders gathered in Barcelona, Spain, last week for the

Global Summit of Women The three-day meeting dealt with economicdevelopment for women around the world

The Global Summit of Women brought together women from more than seventycountries The largest delegations this year were from Spain, the United States andKazakhstan

Several governments sent trade officials to the summit, including the UnitedStates, Iceland and Canada The American group was led by Assistant Secretary ofCommerce Maria Cino (SEE-no) Female business leaders and governmentofficials spoke at the meeting They included vice presidents, deputy primeministers and ministers of employment, science and technology from severalcountries

The Global Summit of Women began in nineteen-ninety It has been held everyyear since nineteen-ninety-seven The majority of women attending the meetingare owners of small businesses The meeting offers women a chance to increasebusiness and professional relationships and to exchange ideas It aims to increasewomen’s economic progress even though there are cultural barriers in manycountries

The summit dealt with problems that women face in starting or expandingbusinesses It provided information in many areas For example, the meetingprovided information about doing business on the Internet computer system anddeveloping effective Web sites The women also discussed how to get financialsupport for business owners and form important business alliances

Other issues included how health crises and environmental concerns influencebusiness The women discussed how to turn traditional activities into successfulmodern businesses And they also discussed how women can balance manyconcerns in their lives, including work, family and health

The director of the Global Summit of Women is Irene Natividad of the UnitedStates Mizz Natividad says in Europe, Canada and the United States, at least one-third of all small and medium-size businesses are now owned by women And shesays eighty percent of small businesses in developing countries are owned and led

by women Mizz Natividad says small businesses are an important part of everyfree market economy

Mizz Natividad says women are also an important part of every economy Yet shesays many businesses fail to recognize the importance of women She says womenmust do more to gain economic equality

She also called on women to do more to improve the education of girls andwomen around the world, especially in science and math She says this isimportant for the new world economy

Latin American Economic Crisis

By Cynthia Kirk

The International Monetary Fund has agreed to provide an additional thousand-million dollars in loans to Brazil I-M-F Managing Director HorstKoehler announced the agreement Wednesday Experts say the loan is designed toease growing concerns about Brazil’s financial markets

thirty-The thirty-thousand-million dollar loan is the largest ever

given by the F Financial experts say it shows the

I-M-F’s strong support for the economic program that Brazil is

following Brazil already received a fifteen-thousand-million

dollar loan from the I-M-F last year

Brazil is the largest economy in Latin America But investors and bankers areconcerned about Brazil’s huge public debt It is more than two-hundred-fifty-thousand-million dollars There also is concern about Brazil’s presidential election

in October The two main candidates have sharply criticized the currentgovernment’s support of I-M-F policies aimed at cutting spending, reducinginflation and increasing free trade

These concerns have weakened financial markets and caused a sharp drop in thevalue of Brazilian money in recent weeks The government has been forced to payinterest rates of more than thirty-percent on what it borrows Many fear that Brazilmay not be able to pay its huge debt

The I-M-F loan agreement requires that Brazil keep its budget at seventy-five percent of its total economic production And it must reduce inflationduring the next year and a half