Avian slaughter

British birdwatchers are fanning out across Malta this weekend armed only with binoculars and video cameras to try to stop the annual slaughter of thousands of migratory birds by shotgun-wielding hunters, from The Sunday Telegraph:

Volunteers were ready before dawn on Saturday for the start of a two-week operation to disrupt the illegal slaughter of birds of prey, flamingos and songbirds which pause for rest on the tiny island during their long journeys to Africa, including garden birds which have bred in Britain. One group of birdwatchers who started on Friday were surrounded by armed hunters who threatened them until the police were called, underlining the risk they are taking.

In recent months Maltese conservationists have received death threats, their cars have been set on fire, and one was even hit in the face with a pellet when a shotgun was fired over his head in warning.

The slaughter of tens of thousands of birds on spring and autumn migrations has become a political issue on the island. Conservationists say that most Maltese now oppose it although a vociferous and sometimes slightly paranoid lobby group insists on their right to blast anything with wings out of the sky.

Last week before the birdwatchers' arrival, a hunters' spokesman called a press conference and branded them 'spies and mercenaries', and their spokesman Lino Ferrugia attacked both legal protections for birds and conservationists.

He told The Sunday Telegraph: "The restrictions and abolitions being imposed are not EU regulations, but local vindictive measures taken by a puppet Maltese government on instructions from BirdLife (a conservation group) and foreigners against Maltese citizens." The British and other European birdwatchers will be alerting police to illegal hunting when they see it, and filming it to provide evidence...