Our human diversity – in the rainbow colours of our skins, in the melodies of our languages, in the spirit of our religions, all of that is part of the beauty and richness of the human condition, but these as you can see here, are threatened. [slide 5] The UN , UNESCO and the Council of Europe among many others have committed themselves in various ways to the protection and even promotion of our human diversity and of languages generally, and yet we have not said much about that really, and insufficiently so in the recommendations in my opinion. Third, and related to what I have just said, une langue qu’on enseigne pas est une langue qu’on tue, you kill a language if you do not teach it. Education of, but especially in a language, is one important step in trying to prevent this tragedy. [slide 6]