In the recent Foreign Press Secretary's statement regarding the ICC, the Japanese version says "this measure is very regrettable (zannen)," while the English version says "the announced measures are very unfortunate." If you look at a standard English-Japanese dictionary, "unfortunate" means "unlucky" or "regrettable," and it might seem lighter than "regrettable."
However, "unfortunate" in diplomatic documents should not be interpreted as the everyday English "unlucky." It is a conventionalized negative evaluation used within a unique diplomatic register formed over centuries.
To understand this, one must look at the history of diplomatic English itself.
The common language of early modern European diplomacy was originally Latin. From the 17th century onwards, French replaced it, and in the 18th and 19th centuries, French held an overwhelming position as the standard language for international negotiations and treaties. Even the Final Act of the Congress of Vienna in 1815 was drafted only in French, and French was sometimes used in treaties where France was not a party.
What is important is that it wasn't just "the foreign language called French" that spread. What diplomats acquired was a "style" for writing and speaking like a diplomat. Research into diplomatic language seeks the roots of the diplomatic language used in French and other national chancelleries until the early 20th century in the language of the court of Louis XIV. There is an argument that diplomatic language developed as a "code" characterized by formality, ambiguity, and context-dependency, where meanings must be read separately from the surface words. In diplomacy, a tradition was formed where one does not bluntly say "you are wrong" or "we are angry," but instead conveys the degree of evaluation or warning through formalized expressions.
Historical research on the 18th-century Prussian diplomatic bureaucracy illustrates this point more specifically. What was required of Prussian diplomats was not merely knowing French grammar. In the recruitment and training of bureaucrats and diplomats, "le style françois"—the French style—was strongly emphasized. Existing research shows, from decades of official documents and recruitment records, that "style" at the time meant a "conventional form" in formal speech and writing. French was both a means of diplomatic communication and a medium for acquiring diplomatic behavioral patterns, and that French diplomatic style remained within the English diplomatic style even after the status of French was replaced by English.
Other studies on this point do not limit the influence of French on English diplomatic style to mere loanwords. They argue that French models were incorporated into diplomatic titles, document formats, syntax, vocabulary, idioms, and phrases themselves. Typical examples cited include:
I have the honour to inform you — J’ai l’honneur de vous informer
It is understood that ... — Il est entendu que ...
These are grammatically perfect in English, but the very formula of "this is how a diplomat speaks" parallels the French diplomatic style. The same paper even describes the English diplomatic register as "almost a calque" of French. Of course, "French origin" here does not mean the etymology of the English word "unfortunate" itself. It means that the diplomatic register itself—conveying negative evaluations through formalized euphemisms without putting the subject at the forefront—was formed with French diplomatic culture as its foundation, and English diplomatic style has largely inherited that form.
Looking at actual examples of "unfortunate" against this background, it becomes clear that it is not a matter of "choosing a word with a weak meaning in the dictionary." In official English-French translations of the International Court of Justice (ICJ), there are actual instances where the English:
It is unfortunate that ...
against the French:
Il est regrettable que ...
is placed. This correspondence can be confirmed in Vice-President Shi's separate opinion in the 2001 LaGrand case, and similarly in a 2008 application. Since international judicial bodies correspond "unfortunate" and "regrettable" in this way in official bilingual documents, "unfortunate" in the diplomatic and international law register cannot be understood simply as a weak word close to "unlucky."
In an even older example, at the 7th meeting of the UN Security Council in 1946, the English "It is a little unfortunate that ..." corresponds to the French "Il est assez fâcheux que ...". Here, "fâcheux" is also an evaluative term closer to "unfavorable," "troubling," or "regrettable" rather than "unlucky." Actual English-French translations from diplomatic institutions confirm that "unfortunate" is placed within the functional domain of "regrettable" or "fâcheux."
Even more decisive are examples where "regrettable" and "unfortunate" appear together in the same diplomatic document. In 1938, regarding the incident where Japanese soldiers struck the US Consul in Nanjing, the English translation of the Japanese government's response to the US government included:
a most regrettable occurrence
expressed "profound regrets" as a government, and then called the same event:
this unfortunate incident
These three types of expressions appear in the same paragraph. This is very suggestive. If there were a simple ladder of diplomatic terms where "unfortunate" is one step weaker than "regrettable," this text would be difficult to understand. Rather, the three play different roles. "Regret" is used for the act of the government subject expressing regret, "regrettable" is an evaluation of the event, and "unfortunate incident" is used as a diplomatic designation for the event. At the very least, it cannot be explained simply by lining up dictionary synonyms in "order of strength."
The same can be seen in the Japanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs' own usage. Regarding a 2002 suicide bombing in Israel, the Ministry expressed "strong indignation" and "resolutely condemns" the act in the same statement, while also stating "It is extremely unfortunate that ..." regarding the series of events. This "unfortunate" cannot be the "weakest word" in diplomatic English, as it can be used simultaneously with strong expressions of condemnation.
From this, an important distinction emerges when reading diplomatic documents. "Unfortunate" is certainly not a direct word of condemnation like "condemn." The construction "It is unfortunate that X happened" does not put the subject at the forefront saying "we condemn X," but rather evaluates the situation X itself as "unfavorable." Therefore, pragmatically, it is a restrained, impersonalized expression. However, that is separate from the claim that "the word 'unfortunate' is dictionary-weak."
European diplomacy itself has a long history of this technique of suppressing directness. From French court language to chancellery and diplomatic styles, and then to the diplomatic practices of European nations, even after English became the common language of diplomacy, its vocabulary, syntax, and euphemistic forms of speech remained. The characteristic described by Araucz as "an accumulation of balanced, restrained, and moderate vocabulary formed over a long period" succinctly represents that history. Therefore, when evaluating:
the announced measures are very unfortunate
in the recent ICC statement, it is not appropriate to ask, "Why did they choose the dictionary-weaker 'unfortunate' instead of 'regrettable'?" What should be asked is which diplomatic speech act was chosen for the statement as a whole.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs did not "condemn" the US sanctions this time. They did not say "protest." They did not say "unacceptable," nor did they "urge" or "call upon" for the withdrawal of the measures. In that sense, it is certain that the statement as a whole is cautious and restrained. In Japanese, it stopped at "very regrettable (zannen)," and in English, it was "very unfortunate." However, that restraint does not arise because the Ministry opened a dictionary and found the weakest word close to "unlucky," but because the diplomatic expression "unfortunate" is itself an expression that has long been used in diplomatic and international organization documents, functioning in correspondence with the French "fâcheux" and "regrettable." And behind it lies the history of European diplomatic style—formed over centuries centered on French—a style that conveys evaluation, warning, and distance through the form and degree of language while avoiding direct conflict.
The criticism that this "very unfortunate" was not a politically strong enough statement, or that they should have gone further to condemn the US, is certainly valid. However, if one is to make that criticism, it should be argued at the level of why the Japanese government did not choose another diplomatic act such as "condemn," "protest," "unacceptable," or a demand for withdrawal, rather than saying "'unfortunate' is a weak word meaning it was just bad luck." Without making that distinction, one intends to criticize the caution of diplomatic documents but actually misreads the special linguistic system of diplomatic documents itself.
