DRAFT RESOLUTION ACCORDING TO ARTICLE 45 OF THE RULES OF PROCEDURE ON THE REVISION OF TREATIES AND THE QUESTION OF COMMUNICATION

BETWEEN THE CITIZEN OF THE UNION

The European Parliament,

A. Recalling that the Maastricht Treaty affirmed the importance of linguistic diversity for the Union;

B. Considering that translation and interpretation costs covers 33% of its budget;

C. Considering that interruptions caused by translation mistakes are increasing;

D. Considering that with future enlargements the number of languages will increase to 25, leading to 600 linguistic combinations;

E. Considering that successive enlargements and the increase in languages, will influence the budget and functioning of the interpretation-translation system even more;

F. Considering that with 11 languages the adoption of a bridge language will reduce the number of linguistic combinations from 110 to 24, while for 25 languages the combinations would reduce from 600 to 52;

G. Affirms that Esperanto is an international communication instrument that is simple, effective and egalitarian, has a great propaedeutical quality, while preserving the dignity of each existing language;

The European Parliament,

1. requests the Commission to launch a project in the Member states to verify the propaedeutical qualities of Esperanto;

2. requests the Commission to carry out a study on the teaching of a planned language like Esperanto as a second language in primary and secondary schools of the EU;

3. entrusts its competent committee with the task of carrying out a study on the feasibility and financial implications of the introduction of Esperanto as bridge language and legal reference language;

4. instructs its President to forward the resolution to the Council, Commission, parliaments and ministers of education of the member States.