incident in history, where people sacrificed their lives for their mother tongue. Since then, Bangladeshis celebrate the International Mother Language Day as one of their tragic days. They visit the Shaheed Minar, a monument built in memory of the martyrs and its replicas to express their deep sorrow, respect and gratitude to them. International Mother Language Day is a national holiday in Bangladesh. The resolution was suggested by Rafiqul Islam and Abdus Salam, Bengalis living in Vancouver, Canada. They wrote a letter to Kofi Annan on 9 January 1998 asking him to take a step for saving the world's languages from extinction by declaring an International Mother Language Day. Rafiq proposed the date as 21 February to commemorate the 1952 killings in Dhaka during the Language Movement. Rafiqul Islam's proposal was introduced in the Bangladesh parliament and in due course (at the behest of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina) a formal proposal was submitted to UNESCO by the Government of Bangladesh. The process of shepherding the proposal through UNESCO's regulatory system was undertaken by Syed Muazzem Ali, then Bangladesh ambassador to France and Permanent Representative to UNESCO, and Tozammel Tony Huq, his predecessor, who was then a Special Adviser to UNESCO Secretary General Federico Mayor. Finally on 17 November 1999, the 30th General Assembly of UNESCO unanimously resolved that "21st February be proclaimed International Mother Language Day throughout the world to commemorate the martyrs who sacrificed their lives on this very day in 1952." Timeline 1952: Bengali Language Movement 1955: Language Movement Day first observed in Bangladesh 1999: UNESCO proclaims 21 February (Ekushey February) as International Mother Language Day 2000: Inaugural celebration of International Mother Language Day 2002: Linguistic-diversity theme, featuring 3,000 endangered languages (motto: In the galaxy of languages, every word is a star.) 2004: Children-learning theme; the UNESCO observance included "a unique exhibition of children’s exercise books from around the world illustrating the process by which children learn and master the use of written literacy skills in the classroom". 2005: Braille and sign languages 2006: Annual theme: "Languages and cyberspace" 2007: Annual theme: Multilingual education 2008: International Year of Languages 2010: International Year for the Rapprochement of Cultures 2012: Mother-tongue instruction and inclusive education 2013: Annual theme: "Books for mother tongue education" 2014: Annual theme: "Local languages for global citizenship: spotlight on science" 2015: Annual theme: "Inclusion in and through education: language counts" 2016: Annual theme: "Quality education, language(s)