Brussels awaiting answers from Maltese authorities

The European Commission is expecting the Maltese authorities to respond to a series of allegations on the island's lucrative tuna industry including through a letter sent by Alternattiva Demokratika to Fisheries Commissioner Joe Borg.

A spokesman for Dr Borg told The Times yesterday that the Commission is looking into the allegations and is awaiting an official reply from the Maltese Fisheries Ministry following a letter sent at the beginning of last month.

"The Commission had already sent a letter to the Maltese authorities on August 1 requesting clarifications as a result of certain allegations concerning irregularities in the Maltese tuna fishery. To date, no reply has been forthcoming," the spokesman said.

"The Commission will be reminding the Maltese authorities on the need to provide the requested information as well as information on the current allegations."

Last week, AD took up the issue and officially called upon the European Commission to investigate the claims. It has been alleged among other things that the Fisheries Ministry made false declarations to the Commission about two non-existent tuna farms and on the capacity of individual tuna farms.

Although the Commission did not comment on the allegations in view of the pending official replies from Malta, the Fisheries Ministry yesterday categorically denied the claims.

A ministry official insisted with The Times that Malta has always ensured that all its blue fin tuna activities are properly reported and documented.

Asked specifically on whether it is true that Mediterranean Tuna Ltd and Deep Sea Aquaculture were declared as existing even though they are not operating, the ministry said that the procedure in place clearly states that registration means that "an operator is allowed to use a site in order to cage blue fin tuna". However, the ministry specified that this does not mean that such operators are in fact active. According to the ministry, in fact, the two farms mentioned are not operational.

"The operators of Mediterranean Tuna Ltd had obtained a development permit from Mepa entitling them to work. This means that they were legally and formally listed with Malta's operational units. The fact that they did not procure fish and did not anchor cages is a purely commercial situation decided by the events that this company faced."

The ministry said the company had until last December to set up its activities.

"These rights have now been lost and this year a different operator from the list of requests available may be given the opportunity to launch operations."

On Deep Sea Aquaculture Ltd, the ministry spokesman said it also has a licence to operate but "is currently involved in legal proceedings of a purely commercial nature which do not involve any issue over control".

The spokesman rebuffed accusations of giving incorrect information to the Commission.

"The Fisheries Department has always supplied the correct information to the EC. We insist that, in the 2007 season, Malta farmed 7.9 million kilogrammes of blue fin tuna of which 1.2 million kilogrammes were lost in a storm and of which 1.3 million kilogrammes were carried over to the 2008 fattening season."

The spokesman said that the ministry "has absolutely nothing to conceal and does not play any role in any alleged international laundering racket".

On the other hand, the Commission stayed clear of commenting further at this stage although it indicated that some of the allegations being made are difficult to prove.

"For now, it is impossible to react to allegations about incorrect information and capacity because, until the fish retained in the catch is totally harvested, it is difficult to have an accurate figure regarding the fish actually transferred to cages."