Maltese bird hunters complain to police over Chris Packham 'defamation'
BBC wildlife presenter questioned by police in Malta over his documentary on 'senseless slaughter' of birds
BBC wildlife presenter Chris Packham was questioned for five hours by police in Malta yesterday over claims that he and his team had breached the privacy of local hunters and defamed them by filming them shooting migrating birds.
Packham, 51, has been on the island with the support of local charity Birdlife Malta to film a daily video diary documenting the spring shooting season. Under a controversial opt-out from the EU Birds Directive, 10,000 hunters are allowed to shoot two species of bird, the turtle dove and quail. But BirdLife International says that four million birds are killed every year, three million of them finches.
Interviewed by BBC Radio 4’s Today programme last week, Packham said that many bird species besides turtle doves and quail are shot, including rare species. He added that turtle doves were also rare, with numbers in the UK down 95 per cent.
Subscribe to The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
"Yesterday I'm afraid to say I had a dead swift in my hand that had been illegally shot and also a dead little bittern," he said.
According to Malta Today, lawyers from the hunters' federation FKNK requested that the police investigate an alleged privacy breach and defamation by Packham.
Packham said that he had been threatened with arrest unless he gave a statement to police. “I did everything I could to be co-operative,” he said.
After the police interview, Packham tweeted: “What was the title of that Clash song? Well, I didn't exactly fight the law and the law didn't win either. I'm out.”
Packham’s agent said that the presenter had attended questioning voluntarily.
According to the Daily Mail, before going to the island, Packham said: “I don’t care if I get shot. If that’s the cost of getting the message across that birds we expect to see in our gardens are dead in some Maltese field because of this senseless slaughter, I’m willing to pay the price.”
Create an account with the same email registered to your subscription to unlock access.
Sign up for Today's Best Articles in your inbox
A free daily email with the biggest news stories of the day – and the best features from TheWeek.com
-
Death Cafe: where people talk mortality over tea and cake
Why everyone's talking about The meet-ups are intended to offer a judgement-free and respectful space to discuss the end of life
By Chas Newkey-Burden, The Week UK Published
-
Mark Menzies: Tories investigate MP after 'bad people' cash claims
Speed Read Fylde MP will sit as an independent while party looks into allegations he misused campaign funds on medical expenses and blackmail pay-out
By Arion McNicoll, The Week UK Published
-
'Another day of chaos in DC'
Today's Newspapers A roundup of the headlines from the US front pages
By The Week Staff Published
-
Swans decapitated in mystery waterfowl attacks
Speed Read Sharp rise in birds being deliberately beheaded, shot, drowned and strangled
By Harriet Marsden Published
-
Colombia’s growing ‘cocaine hippo’ problem
feature Descendants of animals once owned by druglord Pablo Escobar pose serious threat to humans and wildlife
By The Week Staff Published
-
Cop27: EU agrees to divisive ‘loss and damage’ fund
Speed Read Negotiators from the developing world have had a lukewarm reaction to the proposal
By Chas Newkey-Burden Published
-
Why Norway euthanised ‘beloved’ walrus Freya
Speed Read The 600kg animal had become a popular attraction in the Oslo Fjord
By The Week Staff Published
-
Shell’s North Sea oil U-turn: ‘a first victory in a longer war’?
Speed Read Controversy after oil giant pulls out of proposed Cambo project
By The Week Staff Published
-
Fires, floods and storms: America’s ‘permanent emergency’ has begun
Speed Read This summer of climate horror feels like the ‘first, vertiginous 15 minutes of a disaster movie’, says The New York Times
By The Week Staff Last updated
-
Hot air and empty rhetoric: is the UK acting too slowly on climate change?
Speed Read ‘Every day, new evidence accumulates that humanity is on an unsustainable path’
By The Week Staff Published
-
Germany floods: what led to this ‘once-in-a-century’ disaster?
Speed Read Nearly 200 people died in Germany and Belgium; hundreds are still unaccounted for
By The Week Staff Last updated