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French (français) is today spoken around the world by 72 to 130 million people as a native language, and by about 190 to 600 million people as a second or third language,[5] with significant speakers in 54 countries. Most native speakers of the language live in France, where the language originated, Canada, Belgium and Switzerland.
French is a descendant of the Latin language of the Roman Empire, as are languages such as Portuguese, Spanish, Italian, Catalan and Romanian. Most native speakers of the language live in France.
Its development was also influenced by the native Celtic languages of Roman Gaul and by the Germanic language of the post-Roman Frankish invaders.
It is an official language in 29 countries, most of which form what is called in French La Francophonie, the community of French-speaking nations. It is an official language of all United Nations agencies and a large number of international organizations. According to the European Union, 129 million (26% of the 497,198,740) people in 27 member states speak French, in which 59 million (12%) speak it natively and 69 million (14%) speak it as a second language in Europe, being the third most spoken language in the continent, after English and German.
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