“For the first, time Italian is one of the restricted group of languages used in the final selection of European Union officials,” announced Foreign Minister, Angelino Alfano. The news was confirmed by the European Personnel Selection Office (EPSO) in a note disclosing data on the second language known, at least at B2 level, by the participants in the upcoming general competition in 2017: English (97.31), French (52.07%), Spanish (27.29%), Italian (26.83%) and German (18.69%).
“It is a significant result for our Country – said Mr Alfano – as, in the last five years, it has forcefully fought the current practice of applying the French-English-German trilingual paradigm through the veiled distinction between “official languages” (the 24 referred to in EC Regulation 1/58), “working languages” or “vehicular languages”, in every possible context, including judicial, where it obtained decisions that upheld Italy’s petitions lodged with the Court of Justice (case C-566/10) and with the European Court (case T-353/14 and T17/15).
Having positively solved the problem of competitions, Italy is now determined to resolutely oppose any other linguistic discrimination policy that might be adopted by European Institutions, especially in public communications (press conferences, documents and websites), which would mean giving up communicating with millions of EU citizens. This communication is all the more necessary in the necessary effort to relaunch the European project.
“This is therefore another important achievement of Italian diplomacy,” said Minister Alfano. For more information on the new procedure to choose the language to be used in EPSO competitions, please consult: https://epso.europa.eu/help/faq/2422_it?category=332
