Edwin Vella was this morning fined €1,000 in court following his arraignment for hunting offences, including carrying a shotgun in a nature reserve.

The hunter, who is an FKNK official, also had his hunting licence suspended for one year and his shotgun confiscated, after being found guilty of illegal hunting inside the Foresta 2000 Bird Sanctuary.

BirdLife yesterday called on the FKNK to suspend Mr Vella, however FKNK refused, saying that disciplinary action against him and another two hunters would be disucessed once all court proceedings were completed.

BLM said in a statement yesterday that “on Monday morning Edwin Vella, a high-ranking FKNK official, was photographed hunting illegally inside the Foresta 2000 Bird Sanctuary.”

Steve Micklewright, BirdLife Malta’s Executive Director, said, “The fact that an FKNK official has now been caught hunting illegally in a protected area demands that immediate action be taken to prevent the situation spiraling further out of control. We will demand that suspension of the hunting season is discussed at Tuesday’s Hunting Derogation Board meeting.”

BirdLife will also call on the FKNK to resign their place on the Hunting Derogation Monitoring Board because their position is no longer tenable in the light of this most recent incident. Mr Micklewright added, “An organisation that includes people who flagrantly disregard the law among its officials can clearly not be trusted with the responsibility of ensuring that the conditions of the spring derogation are respected and abuses curtailed,” said Mr Micklewright.

BirdLife Malta Conservation Manager, Nicholas Barbara, said that the incident raised some serious questions about the sincerity and credibility of the FKNK’s statements that it will not tolerate any illegal hunting by its members, and the organisation’s self-purported ability to police its members’ activities during the hunting season.

“The FKNK claim to have marshals in the field supervising the hunting season, but we have not seen any. It is also high time the FKNK published records of the number and type of any hunting and trapping offences committed by their members and what action the FKNK has taken in each case,” said Mr Barbara.

Permalink: Hunter Edwin Vella fined €1,000 and has his gun confiscated