Europe may soon be looking to extend its army of translators to include interpreters who can translate Welsh into Estonian and even Maltese with new talks on Europe's working languages set to begin as early as September.

The debate on which languages can be used in meetings of the European institutions was reopened last week when Ireland's Prime Minister announced his government would be seeking official status for the Irish language. Now the Spanish government has announced that as part of the same negotiations they would seek official recognition for the Catalan, Basque and Galician languages.

Plaid Cymru Deputy Leader Jill Evans MEP has written to Foreign Secretary Jack Straw calling on the UK Government to use the talks on working languages to include the status of Welsh in the EU.

Jill Evans MEP said:

"We have long demanded official status for the Welsh language at the EU level. Whereas once this demand was dismissed or derided, it's now becoming all the more mainstream as Irish, Catalan and Basque are now being talked about as future official working languages.

"The Spanish Foreign Minister when he announced his government's proposals said that achieving official status for these languages was a basic human right, for one of the human being's main forms of expression is language. This striking phrase underlines the argument for Welsh to achieve official status. If Irish and Catalan are to achieve this, as I believe they should, then why not Welsh?

"Achieving working language status for Welsh will be good for Wales' profile in Europe, for our economy and our democracy. On the one hand you have the opportunity for Welsh speakers to correspond with the European institutions in their native language and for Welsh speaking politicians to use Welsh at ministerial meetings or in the European Parliament. This would certainly increase awareness of Wales in Europe.

"But this could also be a boost for the Welsh economy with the significant number of new jobs that could be created through the necessary expansion of the EU's translation services.

"With Ireland and now Spain pursuing this, then Jack Straw really has no excuse whatever not to fight for Welsh to be given official status in Europe."

Note:

The Irish government's demands would require the reopening of discussions on which languages are defined as 'working languages' of the European Union, i.e. languages where provision is made for simultaneous and written translation. The Spanish Government has indicated that it will argue for official status as working languages of the EU institutions for Catalan, Galician and Basque as part of these negotiations. Plaid Cymru is calling on the UK Government to ensure that the status of the Welsh language is also on the agenda. The negotiations are expected to begin in the autumn, possibly as early as September.

Diwedd/Ends.