Language policy
The General Secretariat of the Council of the EU (GSC) aims to make its website as accessible as possible to its users. For this reason, the default language policy applied on the website is to publish all content in all official EU languages.
There are a few exceptions to that rule: certain information is published online either in English and French or in English only.
Which languages are used on this website?
This website uses the 24 official EU languages:
Bulgarian, Croatian, Czech, Danish, Dutch, English, Estonian, Finnish, French, German, Greek, Hungarian, Irish, Italian, Latvian, Lithuanian, Maltese, Polish, Portuguese, Romanian, Slovak, Slovenian, Spanish and Swedish.
How are languages used on the Council website?
The website uses three different language policies:
- content published in all 24 official EU languages
- content published only in English or in English and French
- content published in English, French and any other relevant languages
The default language policy is to publish all content in all official EU languages at the same time. This includes official documents in the Council's public register.
The only exception to this rule is certain content published in the 'meetings' section and the 'news and media' section of the website.
Meetings
Information on the Council and Eurogroup meetings, such as the main points for discussion and the location and date of the meeting is available in all official EU languages. A summary of the main developments and decisions taken at each meeting is also published in all of the official EU languages. However, a number of documents with more detailed information are published either in English and French or in English only.
Information on European Council meetings is published in all EU languages.
Press products
Due to the specialist nature of its intended audience, a number of press products are only published in English or in English and French. This includes:
- statements by the Eurogroup and the President of the Eurogroup
- the press office’s fortnightly planning
- media advisory announcements published ahead of specific events, such as summits with non-EU countries
- statements, remarks and speeches made by the President of the European Council - these are also often published in other relevant languages on the basis of their subject matter
Due to the need to communicate to the press quickly on certain issues, press releases are often first published in their original language before being translated into the other 23 EU languages. We endeavour to publish translated versions as quickly as possible after the original version, and each new language version is published as soon as it becomes available.
Why can I not find information in my language?
The GSC aims to provide the users of its website with as much up-to-date information as possible in the language they best understand.
However, we have a limited translation budget and resources. This unfortunately means that we cannot get all our content translated into all EU languages in a timely manner. We therefore concentrate our resources on ensuring that key content is available in all official languages, while limiting the language choices for content aimed at specialised audiences, such as the press.
Although some website content may not be available in your language, you can still access EU legislation and official Council and European Council documents in all 24 official EU languages via the public register.
