Belgium, a divided country

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Straddling the cultural boundary between "Germanic" and "Romance" Europe, Belgium is linguistically divided. It has two main languages.

59% of its population (some 6.18 million people in the North) mainly in the region called Flanders, speak Dutch (although Belgians of both major languages often refer to it as Flemish).

French is spoken by 40% (some 3.29 million in the Southern region of Wallonia, and an estimated 0.88 million in the officially bilingual Brussels-Capital Region). In the capital some 85-90% of its residents speak French and only a small minority speak Dutch, its local language until shortly before Belgium's independence.

Less than 1% of Belgians, around 100,000 live in the German-speaking community in the East of Wallonia.

Each Community is an institution having its own parliament, government and administration and forms part of a Federal state.

This linguistic diversity often leads to political and cultural conflict and is reflected in Belgium's complex system of government and political history.

Each of the communities has a day dedicated to it: the Day of the Flemish Community is celebrated on 11th July, the Day of the French Community on 27th September and the Day of the German Community on 15th November (which is also King's Day).