"Computer translation is getting better all the time but it is still hit and miss, " said Rory Mulholland, a Paris correspondent for Agence France-Presse and translator of several novels from French into English.

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Its contents were first reported by the French website Arret Sur Images, which said reporters heard Sarkozy's comments in French and Obama's reply through a translator.

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Long before my translator - who is switching form Greek to Arabic to French - gets it right, Mr Lamhoud's hand movements signal what happened.

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