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2 maltatoday, WEDNESDAY, 4 JUNE 2014 News T-junction proposed at Qalet Marku Defiant government derogates from EU's trapping ban JAMES DEBONO A T-junction will be developed in- stead of a gigantic roundabout at Qalet Marku (St Mark's Tower), as initially proposed by Transport Malta. The project will still result in the uprooting of dozens of trees, but will have a smaller impact on this sensi- tive ecological area than was initially feared. In its bid to turn the coast road in to a four-lane carriage-way, TM originally proposed a roundabout junction near the Maghtab access. This would have resulted in the project taking up a considerably larger amount of land. In 2012, the MEPA board chaired by Austin Walker approved the road- widening project, but asked TM to go back to the drawing board and change its plans for the Qalet Marku area, which will impinge directly on the remnants of a saline marshland which enjoys Level 1 degree of pro- tection and includes access to the Maghtab residential area. The current proposal, which is set to be approved by MEPA on 19 June, has eliminated the roundabout junction and provides access to the Maghtab residential area from the north-bound carriage-way through a T-junction. The proposal still involves the up- rooting of a large quantity of trees, but this solution has avoided exces- sive land take-up in the area and has been deemed acceptable from an environmental point of view by MEPA's Environment Protection Di- rectorate. An existing concrete area in prox- imity to the small existing bay will be retained and converted into a park- ing area. An ancillary kiosk – which has already been approved by MEPA but has not yet been constructed – will be located in this area. The widening of the coast road will come at a great environmental cost. The project is expected to result in the loss of 56,000 square metres of land, but will provide a safer road de- sign in accordance to international standards of safety. Initially, the project faced opposi- tion by farmers in Burmarrad as the original proposal passed through farmland in the agricultural area near Kennedy Grove. But the pro- posal was changed to accommodate these concerns. The development will still result in the loss of 1,682 trees, which will have to be removed and replanted. CONTINUES FROM PAGE 1 Prime Minister Joseph Mus- cat openly supports demands by hunters and trappers for spring hunting and trapping seasons, and his party has a pre-electoral agree- ment with the hunting lobby. On the eve of EU accession in 2004, the Nationalist administra- tion had issued licences to hun- dreds of trappers who had never had a licence previously. 400 li- cences alone were furtively issued to Gozitan trappers after pressure from Gozitan politicians in 2002. Upon EU accession, Malta was granted a 5-year grace period in which to phase out the practice of finch trapping after it joined the EU, however Malta has per- sisted in opening an autumn trap- ping season every year since 2009, which has served as a loophole to allow illegal trapping of finches and other protected species to continue. The authorities had also failed to establish a captive breeding sys- tem that should have determined the number of captured wild birds required to sustain genetic diver- sity, by 2007. Under EU and national law, trap- ping can only be allowed under strict conditions through a lim- ited derogation from the Birds Directive. Lino Farrugia, chief executive of the FKNK, had previously com- plained that there was no legal reason for the government not to open the season for trapping if it has opened it for shooting birds. "If the catchable species – Turtle Dove, Quail, Golden Plover and Song Thrush – can be hunted, government doesn't need to dero- gate from the Birds Directive to 'take birds from the wild'," he had told MaltaToday, quoting the Eu- ropean law that bans spring hunt- ing. "It's the state that has to de- cide how we are to take the birds." But Birdlife campaigners have said that Malta can only derogate and allow trapping provided that all the strict conditions set out in the Birds Directive are respected – absence of satisfactory alterna- tive, selectivity, small numbers, judicious use, and strict supervi- sion. Finch trapping in violation of Acquis A finch-trapping season is in violation of the Malta's accession treaty, in which the country agreed to phase out finch-trapping by 2008, and replace it with a captive breeding programme. Prior to joining the European Union, Malta had negotiated a transition period through which the trapping of eight finch species would onlybe permitted until the end of 2008. The future of trapping after that date was linked to the success of a captive breeding programme. In line with the acquis, Malta had to set up a captive breeding programme by June 2005 and to assess its success by the end of 2006. By the end of 2007, Malta was to establish the number of captured wild birds required to sustain the genetic diversity of the captive species. According to the negotiated acquis, the captive programme was to result in the significant reduction in the number of captured birds. A captive bird programme had been set up at Ghammieri but was shot down by the hunting lobby. In 2007, the FKNK claimed that the captive breeding project had not been successful and was something "completely different" from trapping. Songbird trapping has been banned from January 2009. The only trapping allowed is that of birds to serve as decoys for hunting of Song Thrush, Quail, Turtle Dove and Golden Plover. Republic Street, Valletta next to the Courts Qalet Marku (St Mark's Tower)

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