Litouwen verzet zich tegen gebruik van woord 'euro' (en)

EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS - The Lithuanian government has written to the Dutch Presidency expressing outrage at a recent decision to standardise the word 'euro' across all EU languages, according to leaked documents seen by the EUobserver.

In the letter, addressed to Dutch Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende and copied to Commission President Romano Prodi, the Lithuanian government says it would "like to underline once again that the non-inflective form of the term 'euro' is unacceptable to the Lithuanian language".

The complaint follows the publication yesterday (5 October) of a non-paper from the Presidency which suggests using the word euro "in all official languages using the Latin alphabet".

Inflection matters

The problem arises from a particularity of the Lithuanian language which means that different words have different endings when they have certain functions within a sentence.

The word 'euro' can be written euras, euro, eurui, eura, euru, eure, eurai, eurams, eurus, eurais, eurose in Lithuanian depending on where the word appears in the sentence and with what function.

According to a paper drawn up by the Lithuanian State Commission on the Lithuanian Language, the difference in meanings can be quite significant - "gra¯inti eura" means "to repay one euro", "gra¯inti eurus" means "to repay all the euro" and "gra¯inti eurais" means "to repay in euro".

These nuances would be lost if Lithuania had to use the same word in all senses, as ministers have suggested. If the word 'euro' were used in all senses, it would also make many sentences meaningless.

Everyday usage

Lithuanian diplomats point to two potential problems if the issue is not resolved.

First, the new, occasionally nonsensical, word would have to be included in all official documents, including treaties and the new Constitution, making the treaties incomprehensible to Lithuanians in some cases.

Second, the usage would have to be adhered to in the Lithuanian media and eventually would have to be accepted in everyday use. This is likely to be extremely unpopular with the Lithuanians, say officials.

National identity issues

The letter expresses these concerns in very forceful language, saying, "the above regulation of the language usage would grossly violate the interests of Lithuanian nationals since it would mean an attempt to exert political influence on the natural process of the Lithuanian language, which is the basis of national identity".

The leaked paper from the State Commission on the Lithuanian language warns, "such a requirement would, without any doubt, increase numbers of eurosceptics. This is of importance taking into account the fact that still there is no clear decision whether to ratify the ... Constitution ... by parliamentary voting or by way of referendum".

A Lithuanian official worried that it would make it harder to "sell" Europe to the citizens. "What we will probably hear from the people is 'we only joined the EU in May and already they want to take our language away from us'".

Lithuania aims to join the euro in 2006 and stresses that there is no problem with the word 'euro' appearing on all banknotes and coins.