The European Commission (EC) has now filed the Court case against Malta at the European Court of Justice (ECJ) in regard to the “scam scientific research” derogation for the trapping of seven species of wild finches, BirdLife Malta has said.

BirdLife said on Friday, that a week ago, on the 20th of January, the EC officially lodged the application initiating the proceedings in Case C-23/23 “Commission vs Malta.” The Commission is challenging this derogation as one which is in violation of the EU Birds Directive.

“This confirms the last and final warning in the official Infringement Proceedings which have been ongoing since December 2020 when the EC had issued its first warning to the Government in the form of a Letter of Formal Notice,” BirdLife Malta said.

“This was after the Government, in autumn 2020, re-opened the finch trapping season under the guise of ‘scientific research’ in spite of the landmark ECJ finch trapping judgement of 2018 which found Malta guilty of infringing European law,” it added.

BirdLife went on to say that “attempts by the Government to justify its position that this was a ‘research’ project failed, and in June 2021 the Commission issued the second warning in the form of a Reasoned Opinion giving the Maltese Government one month to rectify.”

It added that, “after the Government once again ignored this second formal notice, the Commission had no other option than to refer Malta to the ECJ on the 12th of November 2021.”

BirdLife concluded by saying that “whilst all this was unfolding, Malta ignored all these warnings and even the ECJ referral and for two consecutive years, in 2021 and even in 2022, continued to open the smokescreen finch ‘research’ derogation every autumn.”

Photo: BirdLife Malta

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