Multilingualism

On 16 September 2019, the General Assembly adopted, without a vote, a resolution titled “Multilingualism” (GA/12175), by which it emphasized the paramount importance of the equality of the six official languages of the United Nations, underlined the need for the full implementation of all resolutions establishing language arrangements for the official languages of the United Nations and the working languages of the Secretariat. It also underscored the Secretariat’s responsibility in integrating multilingualism into its activities, from within existing resources, on an equitable basis. The draft was introduced by Romania’s representative.

Before the adoption, Bolivia’s delegate, speaking on behalf of the Group of Friends of Spanish, said that the economic and financial reality has led the Organization towards monolingualism and hegemonic use of English, stressing the importance of equity among the six United Nations official languages. The Group consists of 20 Spanish-speaking countries from three different continents. Spanish is the second most spoken language in the world, but only 32 per cent of United Nations information is available in Spanish, he said, calling for an increase in Spanish content.