Irish language advocacy group Pobal has criticised a failure by the British government to provide any information to the Council of Europe on how Irish and Ulster-Scots are being promoted in Northern Ireland.
Under the European Charter for Regional and Minority Languages, the government is meant to provide required information every four years.
However, the latest report produced by the Council of Europe - a human rights organisation with 47 member states - contains only details on Scots, Scottish Gaelic, Welsh, Manx and Cornish.
The report includes information on how the devolved governments are promoting and protecting languages and contains details such as how minority languages are being taught in schools, how widely they are spoken and how they are reflected in the media and broadcasting.
The Council of Europe revealed that no reason had been given as to why information on Irish and Ulster-Scots had not been given.
In a statement, the Department for Communities (DfC), which is responsible for collecting the relevant information in Northern Ireland to send to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO), who are responsible for the UK's submission on languages to the Council of Europe, said: "The periodic input in respect of Northern Ireland under the charter would have required the approval of the executive."
"This could not be obtained last year in the absence of a functioning executive".
Janet Muller, Director of Irish language advocacy group, POBAL, criticised the British government for its failure to provide the required information.
"For the last ten years, there has been disagreement at Stormont about the contents of these reports and no information was supplied regarding Irish or Ulster Scots here," she said.
"This shows how vulnerable Irish is within the Stormont institutions. This time round, the British government has blamed the breakdown of Stormont for the last year, but in reality, final responsibility for reporting on the Charter lies with the British government itself".
