It is not only people but also sovereign countries that want to have a sense of connectedness and familiarity with others and one country wants to achieve this by creating a nickname for itself.
Czech Republic Foreign Minister Lubomir Zaoralek announced on April 11 that officials have debated over an alternative name for the country and have decided upon the name "Czechia." He also added that the country will apply for the nickname to be considered official by the United Nations (U.N.).
"It is not good if a country does not have clearly defined symbols or if it even does not clearly say what its name is," Minister Zaoralek said.
The decision to create the nickname is due to the officials' desire to make the country's name sound less cold and formal, and "Czechia" sounded friendlier. Further, one of the reasons why the change in name was discussed was to "rebrand" the republic and improve its marketability, as well as fit in with other member countries of the European Union (E.U.).
"[...] in Europe, every country or almost every country, has a shortened geographical title, [...] we have not been able to share with the rest of the world the shortened name we use in Czech, Česko. But for us there exists just one possible option as a correct translation of that and that is something along the lines of Chequia or Czechia," the foreign minister said in an interview.
Minister of Regional Development Karla Slechtova argued, however, that "Czechia" sounds too close to the federal subject of Russia, The Chechen Republic, otherwise known as "Chechnya," and that would not be a good thing because of the conflicts it is involved in.
One good example of the confusion the name change could cause is the Boston Marathon Bombing back in 2013 when news outlets- and even Federal Agencies- mistakenly identified Chechnya as The Czech Republic and caused an outrage towards the country-some had even suggested that the United States bomb Prague-and forced The Czech Republic's embassy in Washington to clarify that The Czech Republic is a European territory while Chechnya is in Central Asia, adding that neither The Czech Republic nor its citizens had anything to do with the bombings.
Still, officials want to ensure that they only want to get U.N. to recognize the suggested name "Czechia" as an official nickname. The country will still be recognized as The Czech Republic officially.
