Hunters asks Data Protection commissioner to investigate BirdLife, CABS for ‘secret filming’

“Not only were the filming and taken photos probably unauthorized, but these occurred against the explicit repeated requests to stop filming from FKNK officials who were present on site at the time,” FKNK secretary Lino Farrugia said.

The Commissioner was further informed that some of the photos and filming have been placed on the respective websites of BLM and CABS and that part of the filming will be transmitted on a Bavarian TV station later on this month.

The Commissioner was requested to verify if the FKNK’s officials’ privacy had been violated.

Yesterday, FKNK council member and assistant general secretary David Briffa was fined just €100 for insulting and hitting CABS media officer Mr Axel Hirschfeld.

During a search of the Mizieb woodland by BirdLife and CABS volunteers, the conservationists were approached by David Briffa who shouted insults and obscenities at the group. Briffa then approached CABS’s Alex Hirschfeld and hit him on the face. The incident was caught on film by CABS volunteers and a TV crew producing a documentary for the Bayerischer Rundfunk TV station.

The FKNK now is claiming that the UK’s Crown Prosecution Service – the British equivalent of the Attorney General – had issued guidance confirming that covert surveillance by animal rights groups should be authorised under the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act.

The FKNK is asking whether BirdLife obtained “high-ranking police authorization or any other authorization to carry out secret filming in Malta?”