The Czech Republic plans to adopt the name 'Czechia' in English in the hopes of making it simpler for people to say.

While the neighbouring Slovak Republic, for example, can nestle under the alternative name Slovakia, using the Czech Republic can be clunky and create linguistic issues.

To get around the problem Lubomir Zaoralek, the Czech foreign minister, has proposed the country adopts the name Czechia as its new one-word English name.

“It’s not good when a country does not have any clearly defined symbols or cannot say clearly what its name is,” the minister told reporters, adding that he had encountered mangled attempts of a one-word name for his country while on his travels.

Much of the trouble, the minister explained, came from the lack of an agreed upon English translation of Cesko, the short-form Czech name for the country.