We are writing to draw your attention to the ongoing lack of observance to the laws regulating hunting and trapping in Malta, as highlighted by the recent discovery of 192 dead protected birds in Mizieb (as at 21 September 2009, 15:30).
On Sunday, September 20, the Committee Against Bird Slaughter (CABS) and BirdLife Malta’s Raptor Camp volunteers found 76 dead protected birds concealed under stones and rubbish in the Mizieb woodland. Some of the birds discovered were newly killed while others were the remains of birds killed weeks or months earlier. The first bird concealed under a stone was discovered soon after the volunteers from both organisations, which are running two separate bird protection and migration observation camps in Malta, went in around 9 a.m. to check on reports of protected birds observed being shot at while they were leaving their roost sites in the Mizieb area.
The concealment of protected birds illegally shot is a common practice by poachers. It is mostly done to conceal the evidence in order to escape the consequences of the law or to return and recover the body at a later stage. Alternatively, the bird is too damaged for taxidermy purposes.
But the organisations that entered Mizieb on Sunday morning did not expect, by any stretch of the imagination, to discover the shocking number of illegally killed birds in an area that is allegedly under the management of the Federation for Hunting and Conservation (FKNK).
Please note that despite our requests to this date the Government has failed to produce any evidence that there is a legal agreement between the FKNK and the Maltese government to “manage” this public land as a hunting reserve.
Our volunteers followed the standard operating procedure of calling the Administrative Law Enforcement Unit to record and report the evidence being discovered.
To our shock and amazement, however, when the police arrived none of the usual procedures usually applied to a crime scene was implemented.
The police made no effort to uncover any evidence or secure the crime scene. They simply recorded what our volunteers were discovering. Before dusk, our volunteers had to leave the area but birds were still being discovered. The crime scene was not secured by the police and the whole area was left unattended during the night and early in the morning. The area should have been secured to avoid any tampering of evidence by poachers who had ample time available to return to the area in the night to destroy the freshly shot and recently concealed protected birds, after news
emerged of the discovery.
Moreover, since the police was not searching the area for more evidence, we informed the ALE and the Office of the Prime Minister that we would continue to search the area for more evidence the following morning and requested police escorts in order to continue to record the discovery as required by law. This morning, at about 7am, police officers came to Mizieb before our volunteers walked into the woodland and they repeated the actions done the previous day – they observed while our volunteers searched the area. When a dead bird was found, our volunteers called the police officers, took photos and video of the dead birds and upon their instruction handed the birds to police who recorded the details. By 3:30pm, Monday September 21, the number had risen to 192.
In the light of all that has been listed above, we are obliged to register our serious concern on the lack of law enforcement that occurred in this case and request your intervention to ensure a serious inquiry is held into why such crimes are not being treated with the seriousness they deserve and for a proper investigation to be held to ensure the perpetrators are brought to justice.
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