Chirac walks out of EU summit in language protest

[DeepModem Mom]

NYT/AP: A Frenchman Speaking English? Mais Non!
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published: March 24, 2006

BRUSSELS, Belgium (AP) -- France has grudgingly made room for English as the dominant language in the European Union. But French President Jacques Chirac was not ready to hear a Frenchman speak English at the EU summit -- he walked out instead.

When top business executive Ernest-Antoine Seilliere announced to the meeting of the EU's 25 government leaders that he would ''speak in English, the language of business,'' Chirac had heard enough.

Together with French Finance Minister Thierry Breton and Foreign Minister Philippe Douste-Blazy, Chirac promptly quit the ballroom where European leaders were meeting and returned only after Frenchman Seilliere, the head of the UNICE business lobby, stopped speaking.

''We people speak in both French and English around the table in the European council and obviously a lot of business is conducted in English,'' British Prime Minister Tony Blair said Friday. But he did not want to blow the incident out of proportion.

''People do get up and go for all sorts of reasons,'' he said....

http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international/AP-Chirac-English-Protest.html

[Spider Jerusalem]

1. Stupid, petty behaviour...

(and oddly enough, all of those words derive from French).