Category:Community of Portuguese Language Countries

The Community of Portuguese Language Countries (Portuguese: Comunidade dos Países de Língua Portuguesa, abbreviated to CPLP) is the intergovernmental organization for friendship among lusophone (Portuguese-speaking) nations where Portuguese is an official language. The Portuguese-speaking countries are home to more than 223 million people located across the globe. The CPLP nations have a combined area of about 10,772,000 square kilometres (4,159,000 sq mi).

The CPLP was formed in 1996 with seven countries:

• Portugal
• Brazil, a former colony in South America
• former colonies in Africa — Angola, Cape Verde, Guinea-Bissau, Mozambique, and São Tomé and Príncipe

East Timor joined the community in 2002 after gaining independence.

The CPLP is a bloc in the process of construction and the societies of the eight member nations have little knowledge of each other. One of the unique features of the CPLP is that its members are linked by a common language and shared cultural features, which form a bridge among countries separated by great distances and on different continents.

In 2005, during a meeting in Luanda, the ministers of culture of the eight countries declared the 5 May as the Lusophone Culture Day (Dia da Cultura Lusófona in Portuguese).

In July 2006, during the Bissau summit, Equatorial Guinea and Mauritius were admitted as Associate Observers along with 17 International associations and organizations considered as Consultative Observers. In 2008, Senegal was admitted as Associate Observer.