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Recommendation 2118 (2018)
The protection and promotion of regional or minority languages in Europe
1. In accordance with the European
idea of creating unity in diversity the Parliamentary Assembly considers
the protection and use of minority languages to be an integral part
of the process for the extension of democracy.
2. With reference to Resolution
2196 (2018) on the protection and promotion of regional
or minority languages in Europe, the Assembly considers it important
to raise awareness of the fact that, in all countries, people belonging
to regional or minority linguistic groups are citizens with the
same rights as the speakers of majority languages.
3. The goal that the member States of the Council of Europe should
achieve is to ensure that the speakers of regional or minority languages
can freely use their mother tongue in individual or social communication without
discrimination, and consequently that they receive all the support
required during their schooling from official bodies and local communities.
4. The Assembly therefore calls on the Committee of Ministers
to:
4.1. encourage each member State
to take the necessary steps to ratify the European Charter for Regional
or Minority Languages (ETS No. 148, “the charter”), if they have
not already done so, or in the event that they have already ratified
it, to ensure that it is put into practice and that they broaden
the scope of their commitments;
4.2. devise a procedure under which it authorises the Committee
of Experts of the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages
to carry out, after issuing a warning, the monitoring procedure
in respect of States that fail to submit the report provided for
under Article 15 of the charter;
4.3. report to the Parliamentary Assembly on the procedure
for monitoring the application of the charter, paying particular
attention to the execution of States’ obligation to present a report,
as well as the results obtained;
4.4. create a prize, to be awarded once a year by means of
a competition, for countries which actively promote the use of regional
or minority languages, with the conditions relating to the award
of the prize being decided upon jointly by the Committee of Experts
of the charter and the Parliamentary Assembly;
4.5. implement additional solutions for the application of
the charter, hold regional seminars on good practice and obstacles
to its effective use, promote scientific co-operation between national
research workshops and suggest that working groups specialising
in issues relating to the situation of regional or minority languages
be set up in the member States;
4.6. co-operate with the relevant institutions and bodies of
the European Union, in particular the Directorate-General for Neighbourhood
and Enlargement Negotiations, the Directorate-General for Education,
Youth, Sport and Culture and the European Parliament, on the subject
of the protection and promotion of regional or minority languages
within the European Union.