171 Oxford Terrace,
Lower Hutt,
New Zealand.
18 June 2008
HE Mr Juraj Chmiel,
Ambassador of the Czech Republic,
Canberra.
Dear Mr Chmiel,
Together with many thousands of other members of the worldwide
Esperanto-speaking community, I was appalled to read the description of
our
beloved language attributed to president Vaclav Klaus ("an artificial,
dead
language" http://www.novinite.com/view_news.php?id=94196
) .
While the usefulness of a neutral international language will always be
open
to debate, I cannot understand how an intelligent literate person in the
age
of the Internet can not know that Esperanto is the centre of a living and
thriving world-wide cultural community. For example, does this -
http://mladez.esperanto.cz
- look like the Website of an organisation
devoted to a "dead" language?
I should be grateful if you would pass on my comments to your Foreign
Ministry.
Yours sincerely,
Mike Leon
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