Republic of Moldova

Up to four (4) National Consultants to provide written translation services into Russian and English

Vacancy Number: Pr15/00898

Location:	Chisinau, Moldova
Application Deadline:	13 Apr 2015, 23:59 (GMT+2:00)
Type of Contract:	Individual Contract
Starting date:	01 May 2015
Reference to the project:	Supporting National Human Rights Institutions as per International Treaty Bodies and UPR Recommendations
Expected Duration of Assignment:	May 2015 – September 2016 (approximately 800-900 pages per consultant)
Submission Instructions: Proposals should be submitted online by pressing the "Apply Now" button no later than 23:59, 13 April 2015. Requests for clarification only must be sent by standard electronic communication to the following e-mail: natalia.voronova@undp.org. UNDP will respond by standard electronic mail and will send written copies of the response, including an explanation of the query without identifying the source of inquiry, to all applicants.
Supporting Documents: Terms of Reference Круг обязанностей Individual Consultant Procurement Notice Уведомление о закупке услуг индивидуального консультанта Personal History Form (P11) UNDP General Conditions of Individual Contract

Background

The Republic of Moldova is a State-Party to the majority UN and CoE human rights treaties. The National Human Rights Action Plan for 2011-2014 contains commitments to protect and advance specific human rights taking into account the recommendations of the UN treaty bodies and a number of UPR recommendations. Related priorities and commitments are established under the UN-Moldova Partnership Framework (UNPF) 2013-2017. Reform of the National Human Rights Institutions is prioritized at the highest level of government. The Equality Council and Ombudsperson Office are the two major national human rights institutions in the Republic of Moldova (RM) working specifically on the issues of equality, non-discrimination and human rights protection and promotion.

In May 2012, the Parliament of the RM passed the Law on Ensuring Equality, which is intended to cover all grounds for discrimination in line with the international commitments of the Republic of Moldova. The law provides for the establishment of the Council on the Prevention and Elimination of Discrimination and Ensuring Equality (Equality Council), which is a collegial body established to ensure protection against discrimination and ensure equality of all persons who consider themselves to be victims of discrimination and tasked with the revision of the individual complaints and delivering decisions on them. The Council is in need of institutional strengthening as well as improved accessibility of the public to its decisions and information.

In April 2014, the Parliament of the RM passed a new Law on the Peoples Advocate (Ombudsperson) and on 17 May 2014 started a public competition process for the selection of the new Ombudspersons, however the new Ombudsperson and Ombudsperson on the Rights of the Child have not been appointed yet. As a result of a number of institutional weaknesses, the Centre remains insufficiently known among the public-at-large, and not sufficiently powerful to act as Moldova’s premiere human rights institution.

The overall objective of the project “Supporting National Human Rights Institutions as per International Treaty Bodies and UPR Recommendations”is to contribute to the effective protection and promotion of human rights, equality and non-discrimination in the Republic of Moldova with particular attention to women, minorities, marginalised and vulnerable groups. The project is funded by the Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, co-funded and implemented by the UNDP Moldova and the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), in cooperation with the Ombudsperson Institution and Equality Council.

Scope of work

The scope of work of the National Consultants will consist in provision of substantive support aimed at editing and translation of the Equality Council decisions and relevant information about the Equality Council and Ombudsperson Office from State language into Russian (Russian Language Translator) and from State language into English (English Language Translator) for further publishing on the institutions’ respective web-sites.

In order to achieve the objective, the Russian Language Translator shall:

• Translate selected decisions as identified by the management of the Equality Council from State language into Russian and edit the translated decisions;
• Highlight and report the problems encountered during the translation of Equality Council decisions with the aim of identifying specific problematic areas in the text of decisions and suggesting improvements for the future;
• To compile a vocabulary of the terminology often used within the decisions of the Equality Council;
• Translate information from State language into Russian for the web-site as requested by the Equality Council and Ombudsperson Office.

In order to achieve the objective, the English Language Translator shall:

• Translate selected decisions as identified by the management of the Equality Council from State language into English and edit the translated decisions;
• Highlight and report the problems encountered during the translation of Equality Council decisions with the aim of identifying specific problematic areas in the text of decisions and suggesting improvements for the future;
• To compile a vocabulary of the terminology often used within the decisions of the Equality Council;
• Translate information from State language into English for the web-site as requested by the Equality Council and Ombudsperson Office. 

For detailed information, please refer to Annex 1 – Terms of Reference.

Requirements for experience

• Fluency in written Russian and proven work experience providing written translation services from State language into Russian (only for Russian Language Translator);
• Fluency in written English and proven work experience providing written translation services from State language into English (only for English Language Translator);
• Proven knowledge of Equality Council and Ombudsperson Office their work modalities and work would be an asset;
• Proven experience working with international organizations (successful experience in working with UN agencies) is an asset;
• Knowledge of one or more additional languages relevant for Moldova, including Bulgarian, Gagauzian, Romani, Ukrainian or sign language is an asset;

• Proven commitment to the core values of the United Nations, in particular, respecting  differences of culture, gender, religion, ethnicity, nationality, language, age, HIV status, disability, and sexual orientation, or other status;
• Responsibility;
• Punctuality;
• Attention to detail.

The UNDP Moldova is committed to workforce diversity. Women, persons with disabilities, Roma and other ethnic or religious minorities, persons living with HIV, as well as refugees and other non-citizens legally entitled to work in the Republic of Moldova, are particularly encouraged to apply.

Documents to be included

Interested individual consultants must submit the following documents/information in State language, Russian or English, indicating specifically for which position they wish to be considered (Russian Translator or English Translator), to demonstrate their qualifications: 

1. Personal information (as a detailed CV or as a Personal History Form/P11) including records of past experience in similar assignments and concrete outputs obtained, as well as names of 3 reference persons and their contacts;
2. Cover letter, which should include: 

(i)  A list of documents, reports, analysis documents, legal decisions translated or other task related activities the candidate has completed or contributed to;

(ii) Financial proposal (in USD, specifying amount per page fee).

Financial proposal

The financial proposal will specify the per page fee, travel expenses and per diems quoted in separate line items, and payments are made to the Individual Consultant based on the amount of pages translated.

Payments will be made on the basis of the periodic reports and timesheets submitted to the UNDP Moldova Justice and Human Rights Programme Analyst.

Travel 

All envisaged travel costs must be included in the financial proposal. This includes all travel to join duty station/repatriation travel.  In general, UNDP should not accept travel costs exceeding those of an economy class ticket. Should the IC wish to travel on a higher class he/she should do so using their own resources. 

In the case of unforeseeable travel, payment of travel costs including tickets, lodging and terminal expenses should be agreed upon, between the respective business unit and Individual Consultant, prior to travel and will be reimbursed. 

No travel costs are envisaged under this assignment.

 

Disclaimer In case of discrepancies between the text published on the website and the contents of the supporting documents, the provisions, instructions and conditions included in the supporting documents (published as Adobe Portable Document Format files) shall prevail. In case of discrepancies between the English version and the Romanian and/or Russian versions of text, documents or other content published on this webpage, the English version shall prevail.

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