This month, we’ve been highlighting legal translations in all their facets: the risks, the expertise required, how the rules differ from country to country, the major pitfalls, how technology can help experienced translators, etc. Sure, it’s been interesting to read, but haven’t we blown it out of proportion? Are the actual consequences really that bad? The answers are simple: no and yes, respectively.
For our last blog post of 2025, we’ve decided to widen our lens and look at what happens when legal translations go wrong in an international context. It demonstrates that, even on the biggest stage, avoiding the pitfalls of legal translations is difficult. Experience, expertise, a thorough knowledge of legalese, and a keen eye for detail, combined with a second pair of eyes (aka proofreader) and top-notch AI assistance, are not luxuries but necessities.
The Romanian GBER mistranslation case
The EU has 24 official languages, making translating all its legislation an incredibly difficult task. No wonder things can sometimes go wrong, as in 2020 with the Romanian version of the General Block Exemption Regulation (GBER). What happened?
The GBER exempts specific categories of State Aid from the standard notification and approval process. This allows Member States to disburse aid without prior clearance from the European Commission. However, a translation error in the Romanian text of the GBER altered the definition of what constitutes an “undertaking in difficulty”.
The specific problem arose in Article 2(18) of the GEBR, which states a limited liability company “that has been in existence for less than three years”. However, in the Romanian version, this was translated as “in existence for at least three years”. That is quite the difference, and suddenly the scope of entities considered eligible for aid under the Romanian version is much broader, potentially leading to aid being granted to companies that wouldn’t be able to receive it under the original text’s rules.
And guess what? That’s precisely what happened. Two companies, both of which have existed for well over three years, received grants in 2020. The Romanian authorities tried to recover these grants in 2022. However, both recipients contested the recovery because they had met the eligibility criteria as stipulated in the original Romanian version of the GEBR in 2020.
This unfortunate dispute reached the Court of Appeal and led to a complex legal battle, raising the question to what extent should national citizens or parties be able to trust the translated versions of EU regulations without having to compare them to other translated versions. In short, it was a discussion about the importance of having trustworthy legal translations at your disposal.
The South Korean FTA case
A decade earlier, an even bigger translation-related issue made headlines. Free Trade Agreements (FTAs) between South Korea and the EU and the US, respectively, contained multiple translation errors, prompting the Korean Minister of Trade to issue a public apology.
In April 2011, a long-delayed free trade agreement between the US and South Korea had to be put on hold because the bill contained numerous translation blunders. One of the reasons cited for the various errors was an unrealistic deadline. South Korea wanted to sign the FTA by the end of April, which overburdened the translation teams. Indeed, we can only agree that legal translators need sufficient time to deliver high-quality translations.
To make matters worse, South Korea had suffered a similar issue with the Korean-EU FTA just a few months earlier. Even in the early stages, criticism had arisen that the document contained translation errors. These were not taken seriously by the government, leading to a final treaty with no fewer than 207 mistranslations.
Some of the mistakes were silly mistranslations, such as mistaking “transplant” for “transfusion”. Others were of a grammatical nature or concerned incorrect translations of official organisations, such as the OECD.
Apparently, the word “any” was also omitted several times. This is particularly concerning in legal translation, as a word such as “any” can significantly alter the meaning of specific phrases. In the end, the errors were corrected, and the treaties were signed, but it definitely made the South Korean government look less than professional and tarnished its international reputation.
Commercial cases and disputes
Unlike government-related issues, which often make the news, commercial cases are rarely published with identifying details. However, the types of errors and the financial scale are regularly analysed by specialist industry reports.
One example that is often cited in legal and academic sources is the interpretation of the English term “termination”. The word is quite challenging for legal translators because its meaning depends on the context in which it is used and lacks a direct equivalent in other languages.
Some reports claim that translation errors in high-stakes situations can regularly lead to additional legal expenses of over one million euros or dollars. The three most significant threats in international commercial arbitration are:
- mistranslations that alter the meaning of evidence. This compromises the evidentiary weight;
- mistranslations that undermine your credibility. Erroneous or inconsistent language can make you seem unreliable;
- mistranslations that cause delays. Having to fix one or several translation errors can lead to high extra costs.
The solution? Don’t cut corners, choose ELAN.
It is clear that legal translations require the utmost care and expertise, and cutting corners is extremely risky. ELAN Languages has an international network of over 4,000 legal translators, along with a team of dedicated project managers and consultants, to ensure your legal translations are of the highest quality.
Interested in what ELAN Languages has to offer on the legal front? Read our previous legal blog post or get in touch with Valerie Kerten: valeriekerten@elanlanguages.com – +32 11 49 04 68. She will answer all your legal translation questions and can tell you whether you need a sworn translation and, if so, what the deadline would be. Valerie can also provide you with a no-obligation quote.