Activities of Momchil NEKOV related to 2018/2028(INI)

Motion for a resolution
Citation 9 a (new)

- having regard to the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, ratified by the EU in 2010,

2018/04/11
Committee: CULT

Motion for a resolution
Citation 12 a (new)

- having regard to the Recommendation concerning the Promotion and Use of Multilingualism and Universal Access to Cyberspace adopted by the UNESCO General Conference at its 32nd session in Paris on 15 October 2003,

2018/04/11
Committee: CULT

Motion for a resolution
Citation 12 b (new)

- having regard to the Special Eurobarometer 386 "Europeans and their Languages" published in June 2012,

2018/04/11
Committee: CULT

Motion for a resolution
Citation 16 a (new)

- having regard to the European Parliamentary Research Service (EPRS)/Scientific Foresight Unit (STOA) study 'Language equality in the digital age - Towards a Human Language Project' published in March 2017,

2018/04/11
Committee: CULT

Motion for a resolution
Recital A a (new)

A a. whereas, there is a significant linguistic divide in cyberspace today that further exacerbates the existing digital divide within the EU;

2018/04/11
Committee: CULT

Motion for a resolution
Recital A b (new)

A b. whereas according to the Special Eurobarometer 386 "Europeans and their languages", just over half of Europeans (54%) are able to hold a conversation in at least one additional language, a quarter (25%) are able to speak at least two additional languages and one in ten (10%) are conversant in at least three;

2018/04/11
Committee: CULT

Motion for a resolution
Recital B

B. whereas there are 24 official languages and more than 60 national and regional languages, in ~~the European Union~~cluding the various national sign languages which are an important facet of Europe's linguistic heritage; whereas multilingualism presents one of the greatest assets of cultural diversity in Europe and, at the same time, one of the most significant challenges for the creation of a truly integrated EU;

2018/04/11
Committee: CULT

Motion for a resolution
Recital B a (new)

B a. whereas support for local communities, such as indigenous, rural or remote communities, in overcoming geographical, social and economic obstacles to broadband access is a crucial prerequisite for efficient multilingualism policy at European level;

2018/04/11
Committee: CULT

Motion for a resolution
Recital B b (new)

B b. whereas recalls that 400 million users around the world use Cyrillic and they should be able to use it without barriers in the cyberspace as well;

2018/04/11
Committee: CULT

Motion for a resolution
Recital C

C. whereas multilingualism comes under the scope of a series of EU policy areas, including culture, lifelong learning, employment, social inclusion, competitiveness, youth, civil society, research and media; whereas more attention needs to be paid to removing barriers to intercultural and interlinguistic dialogue while also promoting individual multilingualism;

2018/04/11
Committee: CULT

Motion for a resolution
Recital C

C. whereas multilingualism comes under the scope of a series of EU policy areas, including education, culture, lifelong learning, employment, social inclusion, competitiveness, youth, civil society, research and media; whereas more attention needs to be paid to removing barriers to intercultural and interlinguistic dialogue with a view to stimulating mutual understanding;

2018/04/11
Committee: CULT

Motion for a resolution
Recital D a (new)

D a. whereas only 16% of European citizens have purchased online from other EU countries in 2015;

2018/04/11
Committee: CULT

Motion for a resolution
Recital E

E. whereas fulfilling the Barcelona objective of enabling citizens to communicate well in their mother tongue plus two other languages would give people more opportunities to access cultureal, educational and scientific content in digital form and to participate as citizens; whereas additional means and tools, especially those provided by language technologies, are key to managing European multilingualism properly;

2018/04/11
Committee: CULT

Motion for a resolution
Recital E

E. whereas fulfilling the Barcelona objective of enabling citizens to communicate well in their mother tongue plus two other languages would give people more opportunities to access culture and to participate as citizens; whereas additional means and tools, especially those provided by language technologies, are key to managing European multilingualism properly and to promoting individual multilingualism;

2018/04/11
Committee: CULT

Motion for a resolution
Recital E a (new)

E a. whereas there is a close link between basic education and ICT access;

2018/04/11
Committee: CULT

Motion for a resolution
Recital F a (new)

F a. whereas, all European citizens should have access to the multilingual Internet;

2018/04/11
Committee: CULT

Motion for a resolution
Recital G a (new)

G a. whereas, speakers of lesser-spoken European languages need to be able to express themselves in culturally meaningful ways and to create their own cultural content in local languages;

2018/04/11
Committee: CULT

Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 1

1. Regrets that in Europe there is currently a widening technology gap between well-resourced languages and less-resourced languages, whether the latter are official, co-official or non-official in the EU; whereas some of the latter may already be facing digital extinction; underlines the fact that in countries such as Hungary, Spain, Portugal and Bulgaria less than 20% of the population is able to speak English;

2018/04/11
Committee: CULT

Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 2

2. Stresses that European lesser-used languages are significantly disadvantaged owing to an acute lack of tools and resources, ~~as well as a lack of~~which restricts and narrows the scope of the work done by researchers who, even with the necessary technological skills, ~~despite the fact that speakers of these languages gain the most from~~are unable to derive the full benefit of language technologies;

2018/04/11
Committee: CULT

Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 3

3. Notes the deepening digital divide between widely-used and lesser-used languages, and draws attention, given the increasing digitalisation of European society, for example in public service provision, to the rights and access issues that this will lead to, particularly for the low-skilled, elderly and those on low incomes; highlights in this respect the need to promote appropriate partnerships in the management of domain names, including multilingual domain names;

2018/04/11
Committee: CULT

Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 3

3. Notes the deepening digital divide between widely-used and lesser-used languages, and draws attention, given the increasing digitalisation of European society, for example in public service provision, to the rights and access issues that this will lead to, particularly for the elderly ~~and~~, those on low incomes and all other disadvantaged persons;

2018/04/11
Committee: CULT

Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 4 a (new)

4a. Points to the need to promote ever greater participation by women in the field of European studies on language technologies as a decisive factor in the development of research and innovation;

2018/04/11
Committee: CULT

Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 5

5. Notes with concern that the Digital Single Market remains fragmented by significant language barriers, thus hindering online commerce, communication via social networks, and the exchange of cultural content, as well as the wider deployment of pan-European public services; believes that in order to ensure the creation of accessible Digital Single Market there is a need to tackle the discrimination of speakers of lesser- spoken European languages when it comes to cross border e-commerce within the EU;

2018/04/11
Committee: CULT

Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 5 a (new)

5 a. Points out that language barriers have an important effect on the construction of the European identity and the future of the European integration process; it is of the opinion that the EU decision-making and various policies should be communicated to EU citizens on their mother tongue online as well as offline;

2018/04/11
Committee: CULT

Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 8

8. Recommends that in order to raise the profile of language technologies in Europe, the Commission should ~~allocate the area~~lay greater emphasis ofn multilingualism towithin the portfolio of athe Commissioner responsible for this, and horizontally in the activities of the other directorates-general, given the importance of linguistic diversity for the future of Europe;

2018/04/11
Committee: CULT

Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 9

9. Encourages those Member States that have already developed their own successful policy strategies in the field of language technologies to share their experiences and good practices in order to help other national ~~and~~, regional and local authorities develop their own strategies;

2018/04/11
Committee: CULT

Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 9 a (new)

9 a. Calls on Member States to develop comprehensive language-related policies and to allocate resources and use appropriate tools in order to promote and facilitate linguistic diversity and multilingualism in the digital sphere;

2018/04/11
Committee: CULT

Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 10

10. Calls on the Commission and the Member States to define the minimum language resources, such as lexicons, speech records, translation memories, corpora and encyclopaedic contents, including assistive technology for the various sign languages, that all European languages should possess in order to avoid digital extinction;

2018/04/11
Committee: CULT

Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 13

13. Recommends the creation of a European language technology platform with representatives from all European languages that enables the sharing of language technology-related resources, especially between universities and research centres;

2018/04/11
Committee: CULT

Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 16

16. Believes that owing to the current situation whereby non-European actors dominate the market in language technologies, European education policies should aim at retaining talent in Europe, should analyse the current educational needs related to language technology and, based on this, provide guidelines for the implementation of cohesive joint action at European level, and should raise awareness among schoolchildren and students of the career opportunities in the language technology industry;

2018/04/11
Committee: CULT

Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 16 a (new)

16 a. Strongly believes that one of the major role of the EU is to guarantee equality among all the official languages; recalls that despite the difference in the teaching, evaluation and recognition of language skills in different Member States, the lack of offer of end of school exams in other European languages other than the 5 main languages (English, French, German, Spanish and Italian) continues to discriminate schoolchildren whose mother tongue is one of the lesser- spoken languages within the EU;

2018/04/11
Committee: CULT

Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 17

17. Proposes that the Commission and Member States promote the use of language technologies within cultural and educational exchanges between European citizens such as Erasmus+, with the aim of reducing the barriers that linguistic diversity can pose to intercultural dialogue, especially in written and audiovisual expression and in assitive technology for the deaf and hard of hearing and the blind and visually impaired;

2018/04/11
Committee: CULT

Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 17

17. Proposes that the Commission and Member States promote the use of language technologies, as well as specific sign technologies within cultural and educational exchanges between European citizens such as Erasmus+, with the aim of reducing the barriers that linguistic diversity can pose to intercultural dialogue, especially in written and audiovisual expression;

2018/04/11
Committee: CULT

Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 17

17. Proposes that the Commission and Member States promote the use of language technologies within cultural and educational exchanges between European citizens such as Erasmus+, with the aim of reducing the barriers that linguistic diversity can pose to intercultural dialogue and mutual understanding, especially in written and audiovisual expression;

2018/04/11
Committee: CULT

Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 18

18. Recommends that Member States develop digital literacy programmes and introduce language technology training and tools in the curricula of their schools, universities and vocational colleges; further stresses the fact that literacy remains a significant factor and an absolute prerequisite for making progress in the digital inclusion of communities;

2018/04/11
Committee: CULT

Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 21

21. Calls on administrations at all levels to improve access to online services and information in different languages, and to use already existing language technology such as machine translation, speech recognition and text-to-speech as well as intelligent linguistic systems, such as those performing multilingual information retrieval, summarising/abstracting and speech understanding, while fully respecting the right of translation of authors, in order to improve the accessibility of those services;

2018/04/11
Committee: CULT