What IS "international language"?

The "international language", what is it?
Six official languages at the United Nations:
English,  French,  Russian,  Mandarin,  Spanish,  Arabic.

Only 15 languages spoken by more than 50M persons each.
Some languages:
Mandarin:          1 200 000 000     (1 country)

Hindi-Urdu        1 100 000 000

Spanish:                 400 000 000     (32 country)

English:                  400 000 000     (30 country)
Arabic:                   300 000 000    

French:                   300 000 000     (28 country)

Malais-Indon.         250 000 000

Bengali                    230 000 000

Russian:                  200 000 000     
Portuguese:           200 000 000

Japanese:             127 000 000      (1 country)
German:               120 000 000     
Swahili:                   80 000 000       (as 1st or 2nd language)

Corean:                   78 000 000
Italian:                     70 000 000

Greece: Greek
Poland: Polish

Czec Republic: Czec

Mongolia: Mongol

Sweden: Swedish
Finland: Finnish

And SO ON around the world.
 

So what do they mean by "English is the international language"?
 

I've traveled around the world.
English is useful in some business and in tourism.
But people around the world do not live in stock exchanges or in hotels.
They live in their OWN home and neighborhood and speak their own language.

.