Belgium’s German speakers want to keep the nation together

Belgium is known for the linguistic and cultural tensions between the Flemish-speaking north and the French-speaking south. But the country’s thriving German community along the eastern border is keen on Belgian unity.

Tucked inside a pocket of countryside, among rolling hills and pastures, lies the town of Eupen. Some 73,000 German-speakers live around here, people who are known as the “Last Belgians.”

German is Belgium’s third official language – about 56 percent of the population speaks Flemish, 32 percent French, and just one percent German. Still, the people in the Eupen region are more committed to the Belgian state than their bickering Flemish and French compatriots.

Local public radio station BRF broadcasts popular German music and the community has its own newspaper and its own schools. It boasts 25 of its own members of parliament, as well as a guaranteed seat in the European Parliament.

But the community was not always as secure in its status as it is today.

Before the 19th century, the area served as a battleground for the French, British, Prussians and Austrians. When Europe’s maps were redrawn after Napoleon’s defeat, the region was carved up in the grab for land. The three separate German-speaking communities – around Eupen, Eifel and Kelmis – were divided between Prussia and the Netherlands, and later Belgium.

Bildunterschrift: Großansicht des Bildes mit der Bildunterschrift: Belgium’s German-speakers have stickers identifying them as such, just so they’re not overlooked. The history of the region has been turbulent, especially during the period after World War One.

The end of the First World War was the beginning of a very difficult episode. The population of the territory was forced – and no one asked them – to change nationality and homeland three times within 25 years.

The first time was under the Treaty of Versailles, when the community was forced to become Belgian. The second was during the Hitler era, when the region was annexed to Nazi Germany. The third came after the Second World War, when the region was taken back by Belgium.

That means: three times a change of language, three times assimilation attempts, and the resistance against it, the so-called revisionism between the two world wars.