The European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages is a European treaty adopted in 1992 under the auspices of the Council of Europe to protect and promote historical regional and minority languages in Europe. It only applies to languages traditionally used by the nationals of the State Parties which significantly differ from the majority or official language and which either have a territorial basisor are used by linguistic minorities within the State as a whole Languages which are official within regions or provinces or federal units within a State are not classified as official languages of the State and may therefore benefit from the Charter. On the other hand, the Republic of Ireland has not been able to sign the Charter on behalf of the Irish language as it is defined as the first official language of the state