Malta – Massacre on Migration
Published:
April 26, 2014 at 11:26am
Here are the videos produced by Chris Packham in Malta over the last few days and uploaded on Youtube and via Birdwatch UK. You’ll find other relevant links below.
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http://www.birdwatch.co.uk/channel/newsitem.asp?c=11&cate=__15385
http://www.birdwatch.co.uk/channel/newsitem.asp?c=11&cate=__15385
http://birdguides.com/webzine/article.asp?a=4351
http://www.chrispackham.co.uk/
Was the arrest legal? It feels like the police were skating on very thin ice there. Is the arresting officer being disciplined?
I often see calls for a referendum as pathetic and childish, but I’m really looking forward to this referendum on spring hunting.
This madness should stop.
FKNK went crying to Muscat to shut Chris Packham up, citing that he is a foreigner and should not interfere with Malta’s hunters. How’s that for good reasoning?
I hope the future generation will learn to appreciate wildlife more. I hope teachers are targeting primary school children to teach them against hunting in Malta. I hope that hunters will just die out naturally, maybe in 50 years’ time.
Don’t be so hopeful. Ignorance breeds ignorance.
Where can I buy one of those Bird Massacre T-shirts? I’d like to have one.
http://www.chrispackham.co.uk/news/chris-packhams-t-shirt-design-2014
There you go.
Just buy a black T-shirt with a picture of a bird on it, and go for a walk in the countryside. The hunters will take care of the rest.
What we seem to miss is that this goes way beyond hunting.
And I do not just mean the image we are giving the world of ourselves. But it is the way in which killing birds and having guns seems to make it so much easier for some of these hunters to then extend their violent and intimidating behaviour to people, and to feel no qualms in doing so.
They shot Ray Vella twice, burnt his farmhouse, burned and damaged cars, regularly intimidate walkers in the countryside, and as we saw in the videos, some members of the police are very slow in enforcing the law, as if it is for them to pick and choose what laws to uphold.
There is plenty of collusion in high places by people who are either spineless or agree that it’s OK to break the law if you don’t like it and can use force.
This is a very dangerous path to go down. It is what keeps certain aspects of our society frankly barbaric: the bullying, might is right attitude that pervades relationships between certain businessmen and politicians, and is used to justify beating up someone “because I was provoked”, as if that justifies anything.
This is what is at stake here, not just the right to enjoy the beauty of living things.
It is our very own Mafia, who also emphasise tradition because it serves them to do so. Is it not time to reclaim Malta from this brutalisation?
Seems like this government’s call is ‘total ban on migration – whether it is of people or birds’.
Tal-misthija. Dawn il-minoranzi sabu gvern jaqbez ghalihom u mhux ghal maggoranza li ma taqbilx ma dal-massakru.
Imissu jisthi.
Bhalissa lanqas passiggata ma tista tmur ghax tarahom jigu jaggreduk u jigu ghala biebhom mit-tfal u l-anzjani li jkollok mieghek.
Imgienen u egoisti kollha kemm huma ghax ma jhallukx tgawdi naqra l-kampanja u tara ghasfur itir.
How about that press release sent out by the hunters organisation FKNK about celebrity ornithologist Bill Oddie, eh? Such class.
Meanwhile in Sudan:
Sudan: Efforts to protect migrating birds’ haven
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-27124722
Dated 24 April 2014
The Al-Magran nature reserve in Khartoum has been a haven for migrating birds since 1945 – but many of the species found there are endangered because of hunting, environmental damage and farming.
Now environmental campaigners in Sudan are hoping that promoting the country as a tourist destination for bird watchers could boost revenue, which could then be used to protect nesting sites and rare birds from extinction.
I’m all against hunting but I seriously don’t like his patronising attitude.
Disgusting, absolutely disgusting. I hate making sweeping statements but I think that hunters are criminals, or at least criminals are often hunters too.
However, police who sympathize with hunters are definitely criminals and it’s a shame that we still have criminal policemen on our force.
Really, for shame.
Chris Packham has been called into the Police HQ….this is getting worse.
http://www.independent.com.mt/mobile/2014-04-26/news/bbc-presenter-documenting-spring-hunting-called-in-by-police-4759748608/
This is good:
“On Thursday, the hunters’ federation FKNK filed a judicial protest against the Police Commissioner and against the Data Protection Commissioner, insisting that the police had a duty to “prevent the crimes being contemplated by Mr Packham.” ”
It’s Minority Report all over again. The police in the film could at least see the crime being committed in the future, but in this case it’s still ‘contemplation’.
Do you know what? They should arrest all hunters to prevent the crimes being contemplated by them, that of shooting protected birds.
Laws are just papers, a expense and waste of resources, unless there is proper enforcement, I mean full protection to the victims, the birds.
Why is no proper enforcement happening? Why all this massacre?
Never been moved so much until I watched Episode 4. What an irresponsible bunch of hunters and an incompetent police force. What is happening as filmed by Chris Packham’s team show pure madness, violation of Laws, a land where hunters rule. Absolute madness.
Shame on the hunters who are irresponsible and on the authorities who may although are doning surveillance, are not doing enough to put an end of this massacre.
Chris Peckham’s shock and outrage at the end of the fourth video are what I was arguing about when we were discussing the case of the crucified cats in Mosta, Daphne.
The recognition of an animal as not just a thing to be disposed of, but as a conscious being capable of suffering; a being to which we have a deep genetic connection.
[Daphne – He wasn’t upset because it was an animal that suffered. He was upset because it was a rare thing of great beauty, prized in Britain and shot in Malta. You wouldn’t see Chris Packham crying over a chicken as he puts it into the oven. That is how I, too, see the situation. I am against bird-killing not for cruelty reasons but for environmental reasons and the destruction of grace and beauty. I don’t give a damn about chickens. I eat them.]
By remaining inured to the suffering of these distant cousins of ours we are in effect being lost along the wayside on the long march of humanity.
In a few decades the actions and attitudes of these hunters will seem every bit as appalling as medieval torture. What it means to be “human” changes and evolves very fast, and these people are becoming a little less human with every passing day.
Pardon me. Should have been Packham.