Author: Francesca Marasi
Committee: Art & Cultural Heritage Crimes Committee
Date: 20/09/2026
Languages as identity and European heritage
Languages are far more than mere tools of communication. Throughout human history, they have constituted an integral part of individual identity and one of the principal foundations upon which the identities of peoples and nations have been shaped. In a European Union founded on the motto “United in Diversity,” linguistic diversity represents the clearest expression of our shared European cultural roots.
The linguistic landscape of Europe is in constant evolution: the continent’s heritage currently encompasses 3 alphabets and 24 official languages, while approximately 60 other languages are spoken in specific regions and communities. This rich linguistic landscape continues to evolve under the influence of geopolitical events — such as wars and mass migrations — which facilitate linguistic and cultural intermixing.[1]
Protecting languages therefore means protecting one of Europe’s most valuable forms of intangible cultural heritage.
The legal framework for linguistic protection
At the European level, linguistic protection falls within the broader sphere of “the right to cultural identity”, understood as a category with autonomous legal relevance, inherent to human dignity and essential to the development of the individual’s personality. This protection finds its foundation in the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union, not only through positive obligations, as set out in Article 22, which states that the Union shall respect cultural, religious and linguistic diversity, but also through negative obligations under Article 21, which prohibits discrimination on linguistic grounds.
Under constitutional law of the European Union the protection and respect of linguistic diversity enjoys considerable significance through Article 3 TEU, which establishes that the Union shall respect its rich cultural and linguistic diversity, and through Article 165(2) TFEU, which emphasizes that Union action shall aim to develop the European dimension in education, particularly through the teaching and dissemination of the languages of the Member States.
Linguistic diversity is therefore not only a cultural objective. It is a legally protected value and a strategic European resource, contributing both to social cohesion and to economic development.
Funding as the operational translation of rights
Like other forms of cultural heritage, languages are characterized by a complex nature that intersects cultural, economic and criminal-law dimensions. In this context, funding becomes a key issue: it is through targeted financial programmes that the Union gives practical effect to the rights enshrined in European legislation. Funding, therefore, represents the operational translation of rights guaranteed at European level.
One example is the funding allocated for the protection of historic linguistic minorities during the 2026–2028 period, awarded through projects promoting the languages and minority cultures recognized and protected under Italian Law No. 482/1999. The financial resources allocated for 2026 alone amount to €2,622,506. Given the scale of these sums — and the relatively limited oversight mechanisms governing their distribution — there is a concrete risk that such funds may be intercepted by criminal networks.[2]
EPPO’s role at the Intersection of culture and financial crime
It is precisely at this intersection between cultural heritage and financial crime that EPPO plays a fundamental role. Even without a specific mandate for the protection of cultural heritage, the data presented in EPPO’s 2024 and 2025 Annual Reports confirm its growing importance in combating crimes affecting the financial interests of the European Union.
The numbers are telling: investigations into education- and culture-related programmes increased from 36 cases in 2024 to 47 in 2025. Among European countries, Bulgaria ranks first with 9 cases, followed by France with 7 and Slovakia with 6 — all three recording significant increases compared to 2024.
In this context, subsidy fraud represents a major threat: it not only causes direct financial damage, but also undermines EU cultural policies, as funds intended for heritage protection may be diverted to fictitious projects or criminal activities. By the end of 2024, approximately 33% of EPPO’s investigations concerned non-procurement expenditure fraud; by 2025, this figure had risen to over 50%.
Two emblematic cases
While no EPPO investigations specifically target funds allocated for linguistic minorities, two recent cases clearly illustrate the structural vulnerabilities of EU cultural and educational funding.
The first concerns the establishment of the European Diplomatic Academy, a nine-month training program for junior diplomats across Member States. In December 2025, the EPPO conducted searches at the College of Europe in Bruges and at the headquarters of the European External Action Service (EEAS) in Brussels, as part of an investigation into the awarding of a 650,000 euros EU-funded contract. Investigators suspected that the procurement procedure had been manipulated through privileged access to confidential tender information. Three individuals — including the Rector of the College of Europe and a senior European Commission official — were formally notified of accusations of procurement fraud, corruption, conflict of interest, and violation of professional secrecy.[3]
This case demonstrates that fraud affecting EU cultural and educational programmes can penetrate the very institutional core of the system.
The second example offers a striking illustration of how fraud operates at the local level. The investigation began in Palermo and concerns events that took place between February 2022 and April 2023. A school principal and her deputy were accused of diverting both European and national education funds intended for Programma Operativo Nazionale (PON) projects, EU-funded scholarship programmes for public school students. According to the investigation, these projects were never, or only partially, implemented. Investigators also discovered a significant amount of food supplies and expensive IT equipment have been misappropriated by the principal and her deputy, uncovering what prosecutors described as a “perverse system” involving public employees, teachers, and school staff who facilitated the irregular award of supply contracts to a network of companies. By February 2026, EPPO had requested sixteen precautionary measures, with the investigation extending to universities and secondary schools in Naples.
Although this case does not concern linguistic minority funds directly, it involves a similar funding architecture: relatively small, locally managed budgets, distributed through public bodies with limited oversight. That is precisely the environment in which targeted cultural funding is most exposed to systematic fraud.[4]
Conclusion: expanding the mandate or strengthening the architecture?
These two cases raise a fundamental question: if linguistic heritage constitutes one of Europe’s most identity-defining assets, and if the funding mechanisms established to safeguard it are susceptible to the same criminal dynamics that affect other forms of cultural heritage, what is the most appropriate institutional response?
The most ambitious solution would be to expand EPPO’s mandate to explicitly cover crimes affecting cultural heritage, including the misappropriation of funds for linguistic minority protection. In principle, this would be the most coherent approach. In practice, however, it faces significant political and procedural obstacles. Such expansion would require either an amendment to the EPPO Regulation — demanding unanimity among participating Member States — or the establishment of a new enhanced cooperation framework. Both options risk institutional deadlock and, perhaps more damagingly, the consolidation of a two-speed Europe, where some Member States advance on anti-fraud cooperation while others remain outside the system.
Given these constraints, the most realistic and immediately achievable solution lies not at the top of the institutional architecture, but at its base. A strengthened bottom-up approach, built on specific working agreements between EPPO and specialized national bodies, focused on cultural heritage and the financial flows that sustain it, would allow for more effective intelligence sharing, earlier detection of fraud patterns, and a more coordinated response, without requiring any modification to the existing treaty framework.
In conclusion, protecting linguistic heritage is not only a matter of recognising rights, but also of safeguarding the financial integrity of the mechanisms through which those rights are implemented.
[1] https://www.horizon-europe.gouv.fr/safeguarding-linguistic-diversity-europe-42744