Portuguese language in Asia joined the CPLP shortly after its independence at the turn of the 21st century. Indonesia has also expressed interest in joining the CPLP. The Instituto Camões maintains language centres in Macau, Goa, Busan and Dili. In Asia, Standard European Portuguese (português-padrão) forms the basis for the written and spoken norm, exclusively to East Timor and Macau. Portuguese language in Asia The Portuguese language is spoken in Asia by small communities either in regions which formerly served as colonies to Portugal, notably Macau and East Timor where the language is official albeit not widely spoken, or of Lusophone immigrants, notably the
Italian language in various sectors. Italian is also spoken by large expatriate communities in the Americas and Australia. It also has official minority status in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Slovenia and Romania. Many speakers are native bilinguals of both standardized Italian and other regional languages. Italian is a major European language, being one of the official languages of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe and one of the working languages of the Council of Europe. It is the fourth most widely spoken first language in the European Union with 69 million native speakers (13% of the EU population) and it