It is noted that the European Union has stopped its plans to push for a temporary ban on fishing for bluefin tuna after strong opposition from Mediterranean countries. It is said that EU member states representatives met to consider a proposal from the European Commission to back a pause in the fishing of the species, but France, Spain, Italy, Malta, Greece, and Cyprus baulked at the suggestion, even though France had earlier said it would back the plan.
Spain and Malta started objections and as a result the officials were unable to reach the necessary majority to adopt the commission’s recommendation. Early this month the EU executive member had proposed that the bloc co-sponsor alongside non-EU country Monaco a temporary suspension on international trade in Atlantic bluefin tuna under the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES).
According to CITES listing the temporary ban would give the fish a chance to recover, the commission argued. The proposal to list the tuna as an endangered species was originally tabled by Monaco in July at the International Commission for the Conservation of Atlantic Tunas (ICCAT), the inter-governmental body responsible for the conservation of tuna.
Saskia Richartz, a campaigner with Greenpeace in Brussels, informed that the blinkered attitude of Mediterranean governments would drive bluefin tuna to extinction and leave fishermen with nothing to fish in just a few years. But countries like Malta and Spain are increasingly isolated and there is a growing will among EU environment ministers to save this beautiful animal,” she signs off.
