Thomas Matussek: We must learn to communicate

From a speech by the German Ambassador at the European Language Awards in London

Knowledge of foreign languages, the ability to understand our partners across political, cultural and linguistic frontiers, is a vital part of global communication, of peaceful competition and co-operation. We owe it to our children to prepare them as best we can for the challenges of the world that they will have to live in.

And now I can come to the real point of our ceremony today. And I would like just to say "Herzliche Glückwünsche!". My very warmest congratulations to the winners of this year's European Language Awards.

I hope that the winners will provide models that will encourage others to do more to inspire and to support learners. And to realise that language skills can help to take you to the very top.

Take the example of Charles V – Karl der Fünfte, Kaiser des Heiligen Romischen Reichs Deutscher Nation – in his time the most powerful man in the Western world! A man who used to say: "I speak Spanish to God, Italian to women, French to men – and German to my horse."

Well, I think that horse probably deserved a prize, too. Because, as Mark Twain once said as a student in Heidelberg: "I'd rather decline two drinks than a German adjective!"